The Sound Hidden in the Leaves
by Professional LimeWedge
Summary: How would it have been if Kin and Naruto had met under different circumstances, is it possible that they could have become friends? An enemy is an enemy some will say, but we all know that line doesn't matter to Mr Uzumaki! (Original story by ProKidneyThief )
1. The Forest of Death Part One

**How would it have been if Kin and Naruto had met under different circumstances, is it possible that they could have become friends? An enemy is an enemy some will say, but we all know that line doesn't matter to Mr Uzumaki! Original story by ProKidneyThief (Unfinished.)**

How had it come to this, she was supposed to have been gathering food supplies for her and her team mates. They had to be at their best if they were going to take down the Uchiha and his team, but instead she found herself fighting for her life against… whatever it was she was fighting, a wild boar the size she would expect of a summons.

She rolled under the swipe and a tusk as thick as a tree limb passed over her perilously close to her body as she kicked off the ground gaining precious height. She allowed her momentum to twist her body in midair giving her a brief vantage point, it was all she needed. Within the same second a rain of senbon needles struck the animal, making it look more like a porcupine than a pig. She hushed a curse as the beast shook itself, freeing the needles she had thought pierced its body now revealing them to have gotten trapped in its thick dark fur.

"Just a big pig." She muttered to herself as she took a half second to regulate her breathing. The squeal of the hog caused her hand to shoot back into her weapons pouch, retrieving another hand full of senbon. Another dodge was needed as the beast hurtled towards her at speeds she would have expected from chūnin level ninjas. Even if its speed was impressive, it's manoeuvring was far from, all of its charges were linear, predictable. Another hail of senbon, this time aimed around the snout raised a horrific squeal from the monster, so she allowed herself a grin.

"Yeah, you fuck! Take that bitch!" She already knew it wasn't professional, but to hell with it, it was her first blood of the encounter. Her expression turned into one of worry though as the beast before her shifted its enormous head to study her. Within its beady eye she saw a rage spark that she could hardly comprehend, that no human could understand. So animalistic and rage driven that it froze her in place, it wasn't until the thundering of hooves registered in her mind that she dodged again, entirely on instinct.

"Fuck." She looked over her shoulder to see the hog already rearing on its hind legs, preparing for another charge. Another muttered curse and she was airborne, sticking to a tree before the enormous animal gored the earth where she lay a heartbeat before. It raised its head, drenched in steaming sweat and cast around, eyes darting, snorting deeply through its nostrils, suddenly it turned to her. It must've caught her scent, she thought before leaping off of her tree and higher into the canopy, surely safety lay higher up in the trees against this creature.

Just as she was about to land, a kunai knife thudded into the tree limb, a fizzing tag trailing behind it. Her eyes widened, she had perhaps three seconds before the tag detonated, she couldn't change her current course through the air. The squeal of the hog below her made her breath hitch, the shout of a human above her forcing her to re-evaluate… She would last longer against the animal than another team of gennin. Her sandaled feet landed heavily on the tree limb then, without the immediate use of chakra in her feet, she slipped and fell off of it almost as soon as she had landed. She crossed her arms in front of her and braced for the imminent explosion.

Shards of wood splintered from the tree as the explosion thoroughly destroyed the trunk, causing the entire top third of the tree to creak dangerously before it cracked under its own weight and fell like a missile into the forest below.

She planted a senbon into the branch she occupied and flicked the bell hanging from it issuing an unnoticeable chime before leaping to the forest floor, performing a parachute roll to continue her escape from the animal that was once again hot on her heels. A glance over her shoulder was all that was required to make sure that the team had fallen for her flimsy genjutsu, she nodded to herself as she saw one shadow fall from the canopy, two more suddenly appeared after it. The wet thud of a body against the floor was followed by a wail as the two teammates watched their friend become bug food. The genjutsu had only made their chakra control slip slightly, causing the first team member to slip from the canopy, to his apparent death. The other two were left to mourn as the Sound Genin fled into the brush, followed closely by the enormous hog.

She made another jump into the trees, now assuming that the canopy was safe, at least for the time being, she landed against a tree trunk and began to ascend higher and higher. Until her danger sense forced her to jump. She grimaced as three shurikan whirled passed her and thudded into the bark of the tree, she tried to ignore the four others that had imbedded themselves into her shoulder blade and upper arm. She turned to where the weapons had come from to see an enraged Ame Genin charging her. She leapt back to avoid close combat, which was far from her strongest area attempting to dodge the three kunai knives now in mid flight. She twisted in mid air causing two of the knives to miss and the other to cause a narrow cut along her calf, she bit back a cry as she landed heavily on that same leg and returned fire in the form of senbon needles from her left hand, her right dangling uselessly at her side.

While her target was in mid air it was hard for him to dodge and so he simply brought his arms into a cross guard to block his vital organs, he hissed as the senbon sunk into his arm causing them to fall limply to his sides. The girl saw as he opened his mouth to speak, but was silenced when a tusk was forced through his chest essentially pinning him to the tree. She watched in horror as the hog she thought she had escaped manoeuvred itself to stand on the thick tree limbs, it's eyes locked her in place with a fierce killing intent. She was exhausted, her chakra was all but gone, all the genjutsu, chakra enhanced running, jumping, and climbing had run her dry. Even repelling KI was a task, she closed her eyes for a second, taking a deep breath. If she was going to die it would be on her feet, anything less would be an insult to herself. A squeal shook the forest.

She snapped open her eyes in shock as she recognised it as the Hogs, she was utterly confused to find a large number of orange shinobi climbing all over the tree, covering it from base to canopy as far as she could see, all jumping onto the Hog in turn. Biting into its flesh with their kunai knives, she fell backwards onto her hind and let loose a shaky laugh as the beast reared a few times shaking it's enormous gut in order to knock the shinobi free. For every one that fell though another was more than ready to leap in and take its place, eventually the Hog fell to one side squashing a large number of clones in the process. It wheezed for a few seconds in apparent agony before a kunai was rammed into its eye socket killing the beast instantly, when the movement stopped the clones began to disappear one by one. The one that had stabbed the creature's eye wiped the blood onto his jumpsuit and began to walk toward her, still holding the blade.

She staggered to her feet once again and armed herself with senbon, sure this guy had just saved her life but it wasn't like he could be trusted, surely the only reason he'd have left her alive was so that he could enjoy killing her himself. She'd seen how brutally efficient his clones had been, each was going for vital areas, cutting tendons, carving arteries and veins open, splintering the bones in limbs. If she could convince him that she was enough of a threat, then maybe he'd decide he would find easier targets elsewhere.

She took a sloppy stance and tried to focus her waning attention onto the now stationary Genin in front of her, he moved his hands toward her and showed her his palms in the universal language for 'Im not here to hurt you'. He gestured to the downed beast behind him before speaking.

"It's dead, you know." She tried to focus her attention onto his face but the bright orange of the jumpsuit kept grabbing her attention. She shook her head violently and squeezed her eyes in an attempt to stay lucid. "Are you okay? You look pretty sick." He was waving a hand in front of her eyes, trying to get her attention. She flinched backwards and once again fell onto her ass.

"H-Hai…" She winced at the sound of her own voice, broken, weak, and strained from her near chakra exhausted body. She felt a tear roll down her cheeks as she considered her situation, thoroughly convinced she was going to die. Quietly she chastised herself for showing such shameful weakness, to cry in front of an enemy, she deserved to die. More tears flowed after that thought.

"You should probably find your team mates, I'd help if I could but.. Well, ya' know." She sensed a smile trailing on his voice, not the sadistic or fake smiles she was used to, but a genuine, happy smile. The hand once again entered her line of sight, making her jump.

"Need a hand getting up?" She stared hard at the hand while she checked herself, she didn't trust this guy. He might have killed the Boar but that didn't mean he wasn't going to stab her in the back, just out of his line of sight she brought her hands together and began to gather the last of her chakra. All she needed was enough for a single jutsu, after that she would need to rest. A second later a log thudded onto the bark of the tree where she had sat before, she looked down onto the scene from the tree limb she now sat on, high in the canopy. He didn't look concerned or worried about her disappearance, as he made no attempt to go after her. She squinted as she looked down on him, trying to figure what it was that he'd just picked up. Suddenly her eyes shot open in recognition and her hand shot into her weapons pouch, searching frantically, she must've dropped the Heaven Scroll at some point. She sighed in exhaustion and let herself collapse onto the branch, staring down onto the orange shinobi. He seemed to sense her stare and looked around, she perked her head in confusion, for the first time she got a good look at his forehead protector.

"Huh, leaf-nin." And with that thought, she slipped into blissful unconscious.

-TSHL-

"Naruto!" A scream pierced the forest causing birds to scatter from their perches in the canopy as two ninja staggered through the chest high bushes far below. "Where could he be, it's been over half a day." The pink haired kunoichi cast her eyes around as her cries echoed through the trees, with an echo like that it'd be harder for her teammate to pin them down, but at least he'd know they were in the area. As she brought her hands to her mouth to call again the other ninja present cast a sour glance over his shoulder which stopped her dead.

"Stop calling for him Sakura, you'll bring every single enemy down on us if you don't shut it." he leaned heavily against a tree and brought his right hand up to clutch at his neck, two days earlier an insane Grass Genin had beaten each of his team to within an inch of their lives, then left only after biting into his neck leaving a marking of some kind. It burned, and throbbed, and he could feel it tugging mercilessly at his chakra. He knew he was burning a fever and was a lot paler than usual, he had begun to suspect that the mark was actually a seal and it was trying to activate using his own chakra, needless to say he was pouring all effort into stopping that from happening. But it turns out that even the Uchiha have their limits, and he was morbidly aware that he was reaching his. He tried to shake the pain from his head and complete a sentence, "We only have 24 hours left, we need to avoid being detected and work on getting the other Scroll."

A near silent call echoed through the trees as he finished talking, "Sak-ra … Sas-ke" It was quiet, but unmistakable. The pair snapped their necks in the direction it seemed to come from,

"NARUT-" A hand slipped over Sakura's mouth as she screamed, which cut her cry short, the grip Sasuke held on her was uncomfortably tight.

"I said, STOP calling him! He'll find us now, so shut up!" His voice was extremely harsh as it was growled into her ear through gritted teeth. She squirmed under his hand for a second before he released her, as he did she turned around and back pedalled away from him keeping herself facing him. He hung his head in apparent shame for his reaction, but didn't apologise. She shook her head in fear and confusion,

"Sasuke … What's wrong with you," she didn't make it a question as she searched the floor with her eyes, not being able to meet his. He only sniffed in response and turned away from her but as he did Sakura caught a glimpse of the skin of his neck, she froze. The skin was an angry red, clearly very painful.

"It's that bite, isn't it? It's acting up again." Sasuke tugged on his shirt collar in response, covering the mark again, Sakura carried on. "Maybe we should just open the scrolls, they must know when we open it, maybe it releases a signal flair or something!" She faked enthusiasm, hoping that he would catch onto it and decide it was a good idea, he didn't.

In a heartbeat Sakura found herself hauled off of the ground by the neck of her dress, painfully chokingly high, staring into the spinning blood red of the Sharingan. She felt tears brimming at the corners of her eyes, he spoke with a terrifyingly calm voice.

"Listen to me Sakura. Do. Not. Open. That. Scroll." She managed an imperceptible nod and the raven haired boy lowered her to the ground. Just as he released her, their blonde haired teammate skidded into the clearing he crouched as if to take off into the canopy again, before catching a glimpse of Sakura's pink hair he turned his head slightly then began a slow jog toward them and raised a hand in greeting.

"Finally found you! I tell you, it's a mess out there, shinobi, traps, puppets, even the wildlife is out to get us. Jeez, I think I get why they call it the forest of death." He slowed to a walk as he got closer and knitted his hands behind his neck in signature pose, then noticed the dampness on Sakura's cheeks. "Hey, what's wrong Sakura?" The girl simply waved the question off.

"Where have you been Naruto? We were starting to get worried you know," the blonde couldn't help the curl of his lip and began to rummage through his weapons pouch searching near the bottom.

"Oh, that. Yeah I'm sorry I was busy collecting our scroll!" he pulled his hand out of his pouch in triumph, to show the small Heaven scroll that sat neatly in his palm, the other two did a double take.

"Where did you manage to find a scroll?" The question was growled out by the Uchiha not too far away, Naruto grinned and returned his hands to knit behind his neck. He had been hoping that his raven haired team mate would be the one to ask.

"Aw, no biggie. I just handled a wild hog the size of a freaking bungalow to save this girl. She dropped it at some point and took off without picking it up." Sasuke gave almost no response to Naruto's story but the slight twitch of an eyebrow told the blonde that his story had had the desired effect.

'_Just how strong is Naruto getting? He defeated the Ice user, turned Zabuza, then went toe to toe against that crazy Grass genin … now he's taking on giant animals too?' _After a few seconds of silent thought the Uchiha merely held his hand out for the scroll, which Naruto readily passed over then stalked off into the forest towards the Tower. Naruto and Sakura only shared a look before trailing after him, the former with a slightly smug expression covering his face.

-TSHL-

Two Sound genin sat in the high canopy at the edge of a clearing, one sat with his legs crossed beneath him, his hands together in a sign to gather his chakra, and his eyes closed in calm concentration. The other sat with one leg dangling carelessly off of the edge of the branch and the other stretched before him in relaxation, he sighed to himself after a lengthy silence and turned his head to look at his companion.

"Oi, Dosu." Zaku waited for his partner to open his one visible eye before continuing, "Should Kin be taking this long?" The mummified genin looked down from Zaku and onto the wood of the branch before replying.

"She'll take as long as she takes, Zaku. Don't get frustrated, it's a waste of energy." The boy once again closed his eyes and reformed his chakra, the second he did a grin formed on his lips though it wasn't seen by the other. "Speak of the devil, she'll be here any second." With that said both Zaku and Dosu hoisted themselves to their feet and awaited Kin's arrival.

"About fucking time too." Dosu narrowed his eyes at Zaku's anger.

"What did I just say? Save it, idiot. We'll need to be on top form to defeat the Uchiha and his team." Before the taller boy could begin a retort Kin landed on the branch and nodded at each of her teammates in turn, they nodded back as Zaku took a step toward the girl, she took an unconscious step back which wasn't missed by Dosu.

"About time you got back Kin, I'm starving man! Where's the food?" Her expression faltered for a second before she spoke.

"No time for that, I've had a bit of an accident." The other two glanced at each other before Dosu spoke,

"What kind of _accident_, Kin?" She ducked her head and seemed to shrink into herself at Dosu's tone. He was usually the calmer of her two team mates but if he got angry, she would rather deal with Zaku every time.

"It was an accident, Dosu … A wild boar attacked me, then there was a genin team at the same time. I got over whelmed and lost focus, I-"

"Get to the point Kin, what happened?" Zaku spoke up, casting a wary eye toward his slowly angering teammate, the girl took a deep breath and then spoke very slowly and quietly. Zaku thought for a second that if they weren't Sound genin they probably wouldn't have heard her, unluckily they had.

"You What!?" Dosu stood at his full height for the first time since they had entered the forest and towered over Kin who now shook like a leaf, staring up into the single visible eye of the now much taller boy. She unconsciously looked to Zaku for help who crossed his arms and looked away in response allowing Dosu to do as he wanted, though admittedly with an expression torn between fear and guilt. She Dared not look back into Dosu's eye and instead cast her gaze to the ground in front of her feet as she spoke.

"I, I lost the Heaven Scro-"

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" He raised his fist as if he meant to strike Kin which sent her to her knees, clutching her head in fear and allowing a sob of terror to cry out. Nothing followed and Kin allowed herself to look up again, she saw Dosu's sleeve pooling around his shoulder allowing the device around his wrist and palm to be visible in the sunlight. Without a heartbeat's notice he slammed the weapon into the branch directly between the two and sent sound waves into the branch, making the wood explode out of bottom of the branch. The noise was deafening, but the seconds of silence that followed were far worse, she stared up into Dosu's eye as he allowed her fear to envelope around him. Then he spoke again, his voice back to its eerie calm.

"Unless you want that to be your ribcage," He paused for a second, allowing the image to manifest in Kin's mind. "You'll find another Heaven scroll before dawn … Or the head of the Uchiha." The girl nodded her head vigorously, not trusting herself to speak without it betraying how truly terrified she was of her teammate. Almost as an afterthought, Dosu smirked and added, "If you fail, I'm sure Orochimaru-sama would find no other use of you than an experiment."

She paled.

-TSHL-

**Some of you will already know this story as it was first written by a good friend of mine, ProKidneyThief. He started a rewrite a LONG time ago but lost a lot of his momentum and stopped, I decided to take over in his stead and decided to write my own version of his story: The Sound Hidden in the Leaves. He said a lot of people liked his "Last chapter sumups" so I'll be getting him to write those for me, as well as letting him letting him Beta, so on and so forth. (Team effort guys.) I'll get him to update his version now so that all the old viewers can find it nice and easy.**

**He has a plan for the story to take and I like it! That doesn't mean we won't take suggestions into consideration, just that we have a set plan that we want to take. We'll probably go on arcs and stuff so please, please make sure to contribute! Like I said: team effort, guys.**


	2. The Forest of Death Part Two

**LAST TIME! Kin was fighting a pig thing and was like "O shit, son." Cause she was getting totally owned, then she pulled some special genjutsu SHIT and killed a dude. One of his teammates was like "Totally out of order man!" and threw sharp things at Kin! Then that pig thing, remember him? Yeah he totally killed the dude right in the face, then was like "Kin, Imma crotchstomp your head, man." Kin was like "Eugh, fine I'm F*kin knackered anyway." THEN Naruto showed up all Kage Bunshin No Jutsu and cut that piggy fucker into bacon strips!**

**After that Naruto went back to team seven all "I got a scroll man, stupid sound bitch dropped that mutha!" Sakura was all "yay" And Sasuke was like "Hn." But you could tell he was pissed off really. At the same time though, Kin was returning to her team who were like "LOST THE SCROLL!?" and they were pretty mad, and sent Kin off to get the scroll back.**

**Will she get it back, will she try to kill Sasuke solo? Let's find out …**

-TSHL-

Kin kicked off of a branch and sent herself higher into the canopy, the higher she went the more of the forest was visible to her, so it also gave her a small advantage if she were to be ambushed or should she be forced into attacking. A lot of the villages knew of those advantages so it wasn't exactly useful information but within Oto they had developed a third advantage to canopy travel, which was their hearing. The other villages hadn't seemed to notice or didn't want to share that they'd noticed that sounds were a lot easier to hear when in the canopy, maybe the leaves all around acted like a shell for the sounds to get trapped in, maybe it was just so minimal that it wasn't worth looking into. But in the Sound village they took full advantage of the fact and made a habit of travelling up there with chakra circulating gently through their ears to stimulate the organs. This simple fact had saved Kin's life more times than she cared to remember, she sighed though as she thought it was perhaps the only usable information she'd gleamed from her time in Oto.

The system in Oto relied heavily on skill, if you weren't powerful or didn't show potential to become powerful you were considered low and those who were low weren't a priority to teach. Kin was considered low, she would have been the first to admit that her body wasn't fit for taijutsu, her chakra reserves weren't fit for ninjutsu. But she had a spark for genjutsu, especially the sound triggered ones which were perfect for her with her use of senbon and bells. The thought brought another kunoichi she greatly respected, and greatly feared into her mind. Tayuya of the Sound Five. The girl was just a little older than herself and already capable of taking on jounin and becoming one of Orochimaru-sama's personal guards, all with only genjutsu and a tough attitude. She took another leap into the forest and began a steady pace through the trees, shaking the images of her village from her head in order to focus on the task at hand.

'_This isn't looking great, Dosu won't hesitate to demolish me if I don't get a hold of that scroll… only 24 hours left as well.'_ The thought willed her to move faster and she started to make a better pace through the forest, kicking off of the thick tree trunks and rolling off of branches into free falls ending in parachute rolls. An hour passed before she judged it time to take a rest, when she did she allowed her knees to bend and absorb the impact as she landed on a branch then used the momentum to propel herself much higher than before to hide in the collections of leaves above the thickest branches. As she landed she winced slightly as her weight shifted onto her slightly injured leg and then began rummaging through her pouch and removed a blue scroll. She unwrapped it as she sat, revealing a small seal which she adjusted slightly with chakra in her finger tips. After a second of adjustment the scroll allowed a thin trickle of water to run down the waterproof page, she drank for a few seconds before readjusting the seal to allow slightly more water to flow and used it to clean the wounds on her shoulder and upper arm. It stung mercilessly when she pressed the bandage back down against the four wounds but otherwise she was no worse for the encounter with the enraged Ame genin, she nodded to herself and resealed the water and then brought her knees up and hugged them tightly for a few minutes allowing the weight and stress of her current situation to press down on her.

"It seems that you're training is inadequate, Tsuchi-chan." She froze in place. The voice was behind her … Maybe twelve paces, she would have wondered how the person had managed to sneak up on her, if she hadn't immediately recognised his voice. The sudden shock had made her tense visibly and the Snake Sannin couldn't help the curl of his lip as he sensed the fear radiating off of her. "Even one of your skill should have sensed me when I was being that obvious." His voice wasn't angry, or disappointed. Not even teasing or cruel, he spoke as the statement was a fact. It was, had Kin been concentrating at all she was sure she would have sense the man approaching long before. "You should never drop your guard, Kin." He spoke with a finality which forced her to respond without a conscious thought.

"H-hai Orochimaru-sama." She waited for a few seconds, allowing her shallow breathing to return to something resembling normal before continuing, "I was careless." As she spoke she could sense his chakra all around her suddenly shift, first it was simply enveloping her with cool waves like a lake on a calm night but after she muttered her words it seemed to dwarf her like an enormous wave in the deep ocean. She could tell that she'd angered him. But when he spoke his voice hadn't changed.

"You _were_ careless, you were taught better than that." When he paused Kin could almost hear the sigh he passed before continuing his sentence, finally allowing his chakra to settle into its more comforting but still bone chilling calm. "I know that you need a Heaven Scroll, I was there when you were being careless again, when you dropped yours. I happen to have a spare Heaven Scroll with me here, which I will pass to you if you carry out an additional mission for me." As he spoke he tilted his head back and began to regurgitate the scroll, Kin turned as he did and the man's lips tugged into a smile at the disgust visible on her expression turned to hope when the scroll came into view.

"What mission?" The man suddenly gained a far away expression at the question. He stood for several second before speaking, his voice suddenly quieter than she expected. His chakra also changed at this point, rippling around her as if it was unstable.

"Something which I hadn't anticipated took place," He spoke as if the admission of such a thing was a hard thing to do. "The vessel I briefed you on seems to be a lot more powerful than previous reports indicate. I want you to analyse him, find out if his strength was dumb luck or if we'll have to retune our plans." Kin lowered her eyes to look at the branch instead of the man. The vessel was a result of human sacrifice to keep a rampaging demon locked inside of a human container. She shuddered at the implication that she would be analysing a demon, what could be more dangerous than that?

'_An enraged Dosu?'_

"I'll do it," The girl muttered as Orochimaru stowed the scroll into his clothes and rolled his eyes.

"I know you will." The man turned and raised his head as if smelling the air around him before speaking again. "He's heading north right now, parallel to the river. You'll catch them easily, and Kin?" The girl brought her face up to meet the sannins gaze once again, "I thought I'd mention this now, Sasuke-kun is now in possession of a cursed seal. I don't expect you, Dosu, or Zaku to succeed in killing the Uchiha anymore, but I know you'll try." The girl quickly cast her gaze back down to the branch as the implication struck her, Orochimaru thought that they would die against the Uchiha but was pitting them against him anyway.

'_All for what, to test the cursed seal?'_

"I'll be keeping an eye on you, Kin. Remember that, I'm always watching." The girl nodded silently as the man before her sank into the wood of the branch through some kind of teleportation technique, though his glowing yellow eyes seemed to remain ghosted into the wood long after he disappeared, as if reflecting his final statement.

'_With a curse mark there's no way I'll be able to come close to killing the Uchiha alone, unless I can catch him unaware. But according to the information Orochimaru-sama gave us the vessel is on a squad with him … How am I supposed to separate them to learn any information?'_

-TSHL-

The three leaf genin leapt from tree to tree whilst they kept their steady pace towards the tower, now visible teasingly close through the gaps in the trees. With the Heaven Scroll inside Sasuke's weapon pouch the three could now finally pass this test and get out of this forest. Sakura stared at Sasuke as he kicked off of another branch and ascended slightly higher into the trees, Naruto watched on curiously. This wasn't on of Sakura's "starry eyed" stares, this one was a mix of worry, concern … Fear?

"Sakura-chan, are you okay?" the boy finally decided to voice his question after deciding that he couldn't figure it out himself. The girl flinched at the sound of her own name and looked back over her shoulder to meet Naruto's gaze, for a few seconds she seemed conflicted. As if she was debating within her own head whether or not it was a good idea to speak about whatever it was that was bothering her.

"It's Sasuke." She slowed her pace for a second so that she could meet Naruto's pace a half second behind her. When she spoke the blonde cast a critical eye toward the boy who was leading their company.

"What about him, Sakura?"

"He got beat up pretty badly yesterday by an insane Grass genin, she beat us both up until we were completely defeated … Then left, she could've killed us. Ever since he's been so different, I don't understand." Naruto looked at her as her voice cracked slightly, her eyes were full of concern but also deception.

"Nothing else happened?" She screamed in her head to tell him about the bite Sasuke had received, the fact that she suspected a poison was involved, maybe even more dangerously a seal. But Sasuke had told her to keep quiet about it, surely he knew what he was doing. She forced a smile.

"Nothing. I must be worried over nothing, hm?" The blond nodded a single time, not believing for a second that he was getting the full story.

Sasuke flinched slightly as the pain in his shoulder flared, _'What is this thing! Its strength is constantly growing as if it's leeching off my chakra. It's taking everything I have to repel it, but I can feel it growing inside me … like a second entity.' _The pain flared again and the boy brought his hand up to his shoulder roughly in an attempt to relieve the pain, _'If it carries on at this pace I'll-'_ His thought was cut short as his hand touched the extremely sensitive skin of his neck and he flinched away from the pain.

Both Sakura and Naruto watched in confusion and worry as Sasuke twitched wildly in mid air and let out a painful scream, Sakura's eyes widened in horror as the boy thudded heavily against a thick branch with a sickening crack as his head collided with the wood. In mute horror the pair stood as if paralysed whilst their now unconscious teammate slipped carelessly from his perch and hurtled toward the ground far below. Before either could react a flash of silver hair appeared from the foliage near the base of the trees and, within a second seemed to grasp the situation at hand. The boy leapt from the ground and caught the raven haired teammate and removed a lot of the momentum from the fall, allowing the boy to come to a much safer landing.

Sakura stared dumbly, still focused on the spot that Sasuke had slipped from. Did Sasuke … just … die? A hand gripped her shoulder and roughly shook her until she was looking into familiar blue orbs.

"Sakura! What are you waiting for, you know some medical jutsu, right!?" She did know some jutsu… but they were the bare minimum, what would that do for Sasuke now? She only nodded, very slowly in response. Naruto scowled and shook her again. "Sakura, get a hold of yourself! He's alive, can't you feel his chakra?" after a second of focus relief flooded the girls features and she released a shaky breath. His chakra was there, even if it was miniscule compared to its normal strength. The two instantly began the short trip to the base of the forest to find the silver haired genin already hard at work applying medical techniques to the downed Uchiha, when the two landed the boy turned a critical look to them and huffed audibly. Both took the opportunity to study the leaf hitai-ate wrapped around his forehead.

"What on earth just happened? He nearly hit me you know!" Naruto threw a look at Sakura who ignored it in favour of approaching Sasuke.

"Is he okay, we don't what happened one second we headed to the tower then … I don't know he just grabbed his shoulder and, and," The visibly older boy held out a hand to silence her, then turned to Naruto who shrugged.

"Like she said, He grabbed his shoulder and lost his balance or something. It looked like he hurt himself though." The boy nodded as if to himself then turned to the downed genin before him.

"Was it this shoul- Yeah … this looks bad." As the unnamed silver boy spoke Naruto began to approach as well, getting a look at his teammates angry red skin.

"What the hell's that!" he crouched next to the boy and tugged his collar further down to expose three jet black marks in the centre of the rash. He flinched back as the marks seemed to respond to their exposure. The silver haired boy looked from Naruto to Sakura who didn't seem as surprised by the marks appearance.

"Why don't we ask her, she seems to know about what ever this is already." The silver haired boy removed his circular glasses and wiped each lens before replacing them on the bridge of his nose. "That's a seal, right there." He gestured to the raven. "You know where he got it? They're quite dangerous you know." Sakura looked from one boy to another, both looking at her with an intensity that allowed no refusal, she sighed.

"A Grass genin bit him yesterday." The blonde breathed out and returned his gaze to his injured teammate whilst the older boy furrowed his brow and tilted his head in confusion.

"Bit him, I can't say I've heard of a seal being applied through a bite before …" Sakura huffed,

"Well that's what happened! Who are you anyway, you just came out of the forest! You expect us to trust you?" He smiled.

"You don't recognise me? I tried to help you rookies out before the first exam." The blonde gasped loudly and pointed accusingly at the genin.

"Kabuto! Right, am I right!?" The boy raised his palms in a calming gesture and smiled disarmingly,

"Yeah, you got it. Calm down, man." Naruto smiled in response and looked at Sakura with an approving look, she rolled her eyes and turned away from the two now fussing over Sasuke.

"You may want to hang onto this scroll now, Naruto-kun. Sasuke can't really look after it anymore." Kabuto said smiling.

"Hey, you're right, pass it here!"

-TSHL-

Kin had been following the trio of leaf genin for only a few minutes when the girl dropped back to meet the pace of the blonde she assumed to be the vessel, she cursed under her breath and forced herself to drop back even further. Had she been detected so easily? Her plan had been to follow the three until they made camp for the night then deal with either the Uchiha or the Vessel then, from the pace they set it seemed as though they were going to go straight to the Tower though. She needed to stall them, She gripped a senbon and readied it for flight with a bell attached. If she could time this right she could mix them in a genjutsu that would cause one of them to slip and injure themselves. Then they'd have to make camp.

Before she could complete her attack however the Uchiha suddenly screamed out in pain then collapsed heavily against a thick branch. She watched in shock as he slipped from the branch and fell into the arms of another leaf genin far below. She felt that chakra before he slipped. It was unmistakably the cursed seal thrashing to be released. The next thing she knew the other two members of the team descended from the tree's and began to talk with the boy, she recognised him as the one who'd said that the Sound Village was insignificant before the first exam. Her situation wasn't getting easier, she knew that much without being told. Her number of enemies had just risen from three to four with that four eyed speck of dust around. Silently she settled in a nest of leaves and watched the four begin to set up a makeshift camp for the Uchiha's recovery.

-TSHL-

Three hours had passed since Sasuke had fallen from the trees and the three conscious leaf genin had set up a small camp before the sun had set that they could defend fairly easily. Naruto and Kabuto had wandered off briefly to collect some food, returning only half an hour later with several large fish. Which were now cooking over the small smokeless fire that the three now sat around.

"I wonder how that Sound girl is getting on." Naruto spoke out of the blue, causing both Kabuto and Sakura to look at him curiously. Kin raised an eyebrow from her position a few dozen paces away and silently willed the blonde to continue.

"What do you mean?" Sakura tilted her head in confusion.

"The Sound girl I saved before, when I got the heaven scroll?" His voice echoed around in Kin's head, the Vessel was the one who saved her from the boar? Kabuto's voice was the one that responded.

"I'd say she's probably fine, A new village like Oto would only send their very best to represent them for the first exam." Sakura seemed satisfied with the logic and nodded in response.

"Why are you even worried about her Naruto?" Sakura asked the question on Kin's mind for her, but the blonde only shrugged.

"She just seemed really scared, she was cut up pretty bad you know." Kabuto's eyes softened in concern.

"Hopefully she knows how to take care of her wounds or she might die from infection." Naruto's face dropped when the silver haired boy said that.

"Do you really think that might happen?" The older boy shrugged his shoulders as he responded.

"Like I said though, Oto would only send their very best genin here." A few more minutes passed in relative silence before Sakura decided to speak her mind on the matter.

"You said she ran away, didn't you?" Naruto nodded at Sakura's words and waited for her to continue. "Well she's obviously a coward then," Kin slumped within her hiding place. The pink haired girl was right of course … but to have her flaws pointed out to her by someone who's never even met her made her feel slightly less confident in herself as a kunoichi. She sighed quietly to herself and tried to ignore the growing self hatred inside her head.

"Sakura-chan, don't be mean like that," Kin felt her eyes settle on the blonde boy through the leaves. No one had ever defended her before, her heart suddenly felt like it was pumping a lot faster than before when the boy carried on talking. "She was obviously hurt, Sakura-chan. She looked pretty sick too, she wasn't in any condition to fight!" Kin found herself nodding furiously in agreement, that pink Bitch had no right to make accusations about her! The pink haired girl tutted a few times in response and Kin felt her confidence wain slightly.

"If she spent more time confronting danger instead of running away, maybe she'd be able to grow a bit stronger. Then maybe she would have been able to defend herself properly." Kabuto glanced from one to the other before sighing quietly.

"I think Sakura might be right, you know?" The girl looked triumphant for a second before Kabuto shook a finger at her. "There is a big difference between running away and retreating though." Naruto took the opportunity to speak again.

"Yeah, Sakura! Maybe she was a medic, or one of her teammates was injured? You can't jump to conclusions, ya know? That's what Kakashi-sensei keeps sayin' to us!" Naruto stood up as he spoke and turned on his heel once he finished then began stalking off into the forest to do a short patrol around the area. Kin was shocked though, this boy had defended her … to his own teammate no less! She silently considered following him into the trees and cast a glance in the direction he'd wandered off in before looking back to the camp. No, she would stay. With the Curse mark, the Uchiha was priority one right now. Sakura, kin observed looked just as shocked from Naruto's outburst and stood up a few second after he disappeared and glared violently in his general direction.

"Fine! Have fun doing the night watch ALONE, Naruto!" She yelled into the darkness before flopping onto a sleeping bag and gesturing for Kabuto to do the same, as if in fear of her wrath, he did exactly that.

-TSHL-

A few hours had passed since Naruto had staked off into the forest and he had since returned and was now poking at the small fire with a stick he'd brought back with him. He gently poked at the fire a few more times whilst Kin watched, then began to unseal a few of the fish he and Kabuto had caught to roast over the fire. Kin had wanted to deal with the Uchiha whilst the Vessel, it felt wrong to call him that anymore, was gone. But Kabuto had made a point of remaining awake until the blonde returned from his patrol, silently she judged that enough time had passed she was running out of time and needed to at least attempt to get to the Uchiha whilst he was vulnerable.

Naruto stiffened slightly as the bushes behind his rustled slightly louder than he would expect from the wind. He fell into a defensive position and began to stalk toward the foliage, his kunai knife now clutched tightly in one hand.

-TSHL-

**Okay guys, that's a wrap for chapter two. I've officially completed the rewrite of my friend's original chapter one (Doubled the length, bitches. He's complaining that I'm dragging it out right now, I can tell he's jealous of my mad skillz though, bro.) I hope you all enjoyed it and maybe a few of you picked up on a few of the changes I made from the original. **

**I decided that Orochimaru's character should be a little different from how my friend portrayed him, and the same with Kin! I'm trying to make her seem more brash and actual kunoichi like. My friend admits he made her too soft in his version, something I'm trying to avoid. The biggest difference though is the addition of Kabuto to the story, we all know who he works for but neither Kin, nor team seven do! I think it'll work nicely, especially when Orochimaru said "I'm always watching." Well, with Kabuto around, he really is! **

**Hopefully my slightly lengthy A/Ns aren't bothering people too much. I just like to make a note of the difference I've made =)**


	3. The Forest of Death Part Three

**LAST TIME!**

**Kin was being all ninja and jumping through the trees when BAM! Orochimaru to the FACE. So that snake guy was like "Ohai Kin, do this thing plz?" She was like "Uhm, y wud I do that, like?" Then he flashed her a charming smile and a heaven scroll. She was like "O, k den!" and agreed to like, spy on Naruto or something. Then Sasuke fell out of a tree but was saved by Kabuto who just HAPPENED to be passing by, I call BS. Then Naruto and Kabuto set up camp with Sakura, whilst Kin watched from a hidey hole. Right where we left off, Naruto was approaching Kin's hiding place, KUNAI DRAWN. **

-TSHL-

Kin held her breath as she watched the blonde approach her hiding spot through the leaves, strictly she knew she was at a disadvantage, especially with someone who was so obviously a short range fighter. But she had used this same feint before and had seen it work wonders … she continued to hold her breath as the boy approached then as he got within a few paces she tugged on the wire she held in her right hand. Across the clearing an almost imperceptible chime rang out. Everything happened within a heartbeat from then.

The blonde took the bait and began to turn his head, during the same moment Kin released the breath she was holding and let a fired a kunai at full strength right into the boy at point blank range. Of the many things she was expecting, a burst of cloud wasn't on her list. Her pupils dilated in fear at that moment, and without a second's thought she abandoned her hiding spot and re hid herself a few dozen paces away still with a view of the camp. After a second a very tired looking Uzumaki stumbled out of the forest and into the clearing, he glanced around himself as if confused before setting his sight once again on the suspicious bush. Kin narrowed her eyes as she considered her next move.

The boy was obviously talented with some kind of bunshin jutsu, which meant the one currently in the clearing was most likely another clone. If that was the case, then the real Uzumaki was somewhere in the forest looking over the clearing, much like herself. She felt her lip curl at that thought, her speciality was this situation exactly. Two shinobi in a stalemate with neither willing to reveal themselves, she held back a laugh and readied a senbon for flight with a bell. She might not be able to attack the original directly, but if he was within hearing distance then he'd be caught in her gen-jutsu, then it would be game over. She raised the senbon and took aim at the blonde in the clearing, still approaching the bush. Her brow furrowed for second, if this WAS a clone … then where was the original? She took a second to commit her senses to hearing only to turn around immediately, eyes wide open into a defensive stance.

"What are you doing, Sound-san?" Her heart thundered in her ears and she recalled memories of the conversation she'd just had with the Otokage.

'_I was careless, I should've tried to find him before taking out the clone.'_ she brushed the thought from her head and began to consider her situation. The blonde was crouched on a branch a meter or so away, slightly higher than her spot giving him both an attacking and defensive bonus. If she tried a genjutsu now she was sure he'd be able to identify and properly release it with ease buying her maybe a split second, not nearly enough with a close combat specialist. She found herself looking at the boys eyes, there was no malice, fear, or anger in them. Just simple curiosity. She began to lower her senbon when she recalled what the pink haired girl had said before.

'_If she spent more time confronting danger instead of running away, maybe she'd be able to grow a bit stronger. Then maybe she would have been able to defend herself properly.' _She gathered as much courage as she could muster and raised her hand once again, the senbon poised to throw. The blonde followed her hand as it rose and gently shook his head, she understood his meaning perfectly. If she were to attack him now then he wouldn't have any choice but to fight back, and he knew that he would win without being told. It surprised her then that he didn't take advantage of the situation. In her experience, any one would have taken full advantage of her at that point. Instead she found herself silently locked in a battle of wills with those now hypnotic eyes, gently forcing her to lower her weapon. Several seconds passed before Kin fully lowered her needle but she still gave the boy a savage look, he returned it with one of curiosity. She saw his eyes dart down to her now fully lowered hands before returning to her eyes, she knew. It was now, she was sure that in the next second or two another clone would rush her from the forest, perhaps a kunai would sail through the air. She closed her eyes and let a breath pass her lips.

'_I've failed. He'll kill me now, and if by whatever miracle he doesn't a fate a hundred times worse awaits me with Dosu, Zaku, and Orochimaru.' _Her brow furrowed and her lip trembled. _'Did I only lower my weapon because it was the easy way out? That pink haired girl was right, I am a coward.'_

"You're not a coward, you know." Kin's breath hitched as her eyes shot open to meet the blue, now looking away as if slightly embarrassed. He scratched the side of his face as she stared at him incredulously. "When my teammate said that earlier, she didn't know what she was talking about. I'm guessing you heard her, right?" Kin nodded dumbly, still not able to find her voice. He looked at the floor when he saw her nod as if he were ashamed. "Sorry about her, really she's a nice person. Just not taking Kakashi-sensei's advice yet." He beamed at her.

"Why are you …" she stopped short, unable to find words to match her feelings. He tilted his head to one side.

"Why am I wha-"

"WHY ARE YOU NICE TO ME!?" Naruto flinched backwards at the sudden volume of Kin's voice and slipped backwards off of his perch, thudding onto the earth a few meters below. He grumbled slightly as he got back onto his feet and looked at Kin who was sending him a fiery look.

"I have to have a reason to be nice!?" he narrowed his eyes at her as he cradled a bump slowly growing on his hind, Kin simply huffed and cast her gaze away.

"Like any shinobi needs a reason not to be, especially to an enemy shinobi." Naruto threw her a confused look before growling quietly.

"Oh! So just because I'm a ninja I can't be nice to other ninja? How'd ya think alliances started?" Kin pulled a deadpan face,

"Not like this, not with guys like you." He looked hurt for a second before scoffing,

"Oh yeah, and as if you were there for every alliance ever made." Kin sighed and met his eyes for a second, her eyes still brimming with the tears she passed when she thought she was going to die. She wanted a real answer. Naruto looked uncomfortable for a second before nodding slightly and casting his gaze back toward the camp.

"I'm nice to everyone, just cause it's how I wanna be treated, ya know? My teammates give me a hard time a lot and I'm not exactly Mr popular in the village, I just want people to be nice back." He jutted out his lower lip at the admission childishly, as if he was being punished. But Kin couldn't help but allow the tears she'd been holding back to flow, and the sob she'd been fighting to crack through her stinging throat. He was the same as she was … Just looking for acceptance in a life that didn't seem to want to accept her. The boy looked at her concerned that his words had had such an affect but he didn't need to stop himself from approaching as a second later a call echoed through the trees.

"Naruto!?" He cast his gaze back to the clearing from the girl,

"Sakura, she must've heard you yell before." She was holding a hand over her mouth to muffle the whines that emanated from deep inside of her, whilst simultaneously wiping at her eyes with the other hand. He searched the ground for a second whilst he wrestled with a thought in his head. "We have plenty of food if you wanna, I dunno… join us or something?" He scratched the back of his head awkwardly as he spoke and Kin couldn't help but scoff under her breath as she regained her composure.

"You really are a ridiculous ninja." He gave her a lopsided smirk and awaited her response. "I don't think your teammate would want me around, so thanks but no thanks." Without another word she turned and crouched as if to take off into the forest, but stopped when a rough hand slipped around her wrist and held her in place. Her heart skipped and then thundered as her memory rushed to the last time a person had gripped her in a similar way. She couldn't, WOULDN'T allow that to happen again.

Suddenly, and with deceptive strength the girl began to thrash violently away from Naruto attempting to free her wrist from his grasp, he watched in shock and obvious worry as the tear tracks became visible down her cheeks once again. He felt his throat tighten and stepped forward, wrapping his other arm around the girls back, bringing her into a tight hug. Resisting her as she shook violently against his grip and took in deep lungfuls of air between sobs.

"Sound-san, calm down. I'm not going to hurt you, I won't let anyone hurt you … Just calm down … Calm down." His voice became quieter and quieter as the girl stopped trying to resist his grip and began to latch back onto him as if he were a life line, slowly she returned to herself and looked into the orange of the boys jumpsuit. She remembered how he had put himself in danger in order to fight the Boar, no thought for his own safety, no thought of reward, or of taking advantage. She sighed at what she was about to do.

"Kin." The boy released his grip enough that he could examine her suddenly shy expression.

"What did you say?" She ducked her head for a second before looking up, her burning look back in place.

"My name is Kin, shut up with the "Sound-san" nonsense." She bit back a smile as he let one spread across his face, touching every feature from his eyes to his ears.

"I'm Naruto, over there is Sakura, Sasuke, and Kabuto." The girls eyes hollowed slightly at the mention of Sasuke and she receded into her own mind as she thought.

'_Why did it have to be his teammate. The first person who seems to genuinely understand how I feel, and give a damn about it … His teammate is on my hitlist.'_ She manoeuvred her arms to come between herself and the seemingly happy blonde then created a brief string of handseals. She gave him one last look of apology before completing the Substituation Jutsu for the second time in his company.

A second passed before Naruto sighed and dropped the log that had replaced Kin and silently made his way towards camp, vowing that he wouldn't share his encounter with the Sound shinobi with Sakura or Kabuto.

"I'm here Sakura, I was just taking a leak don't worry."

"Jeez Naruto, too much information."

The third shinobi that had observed the entire interaction between the two genin silently made his way to a vantage point and gazed into the clearing once again, going by completely unnoticed.

-TSHL-

Kin leaned against an enormous fallen tree that created a wall of thick wood behind her, she wiped furiously at the stray tears that were still running down her cheeks and subconsciously chipped away at the bark with her thumbnail, she often found herself doing this when she was lost in thought. Why had she even been crying? She couldn't remember the last time she had cried, she only knew that it had been years, perhaps even before her time in Oto. Usually she was as uncompromising as steel, an icy persona kept even her own teammates at a firm distance, but this person, this … Vessel was getting through her defences like they didn't exist. She dug deeper into the wood of the tree with her nail as her thoughts carried on, could it have been the influence of the demon? Destroying her defences so subtly that she hadn't even realised it was being done. It was certainly crafty enough for a demon to have thought it up, but she didn't really believe it. Some part of her knew that it was him, the boy that had gotten through to her, not the demon.

She let her thoughts of the blonde enigma drift from her mind and she hid herself among a patch of large ferns before settling down into sleep, dreaming of something … dark.

When Kin awoke again she stared up into the sky and attempted to recall the strings of her half remembered dream, then she saw the first signs of dawn appearing across the sky. She frowned to herself as she decided she had less than 12 hours left of the exam. Deciding this she stood up and began to stretch out her legs, then froze. She wasn't sure how she hadn't realised it before, but several things were different about the area she had slept in. The scent of roasted fish was strong in the air and within a few seconds he found the meal wrapped up in a few layers of plastic film, subtly hidden under a smaller fern. When she bent down to check under the leaf she found something that shocked her a lot more, a Heaven Scroll stared back at her from its position in the dirt. Her instincts screamed at her to dodge and she involuntarily scrambled backwards away from it, surely it had to be a trap, surely?

She fell into a defensive position as she mentally extended her senses then applied her hearing to check for any who may have been watching … sensing no one, she approached the scroll with obvious caution then extended her chakra toward it in an attempt to check it for a genjutsu, there were none. She briefly looked about herself, checking once again for signs of an observer. Then. Slowly. She extended a hand and picked the scroll up, after a second a smile brushed across her features and she stowed it into her pouch. She looked at the packet of fish in the other hand and smiled ever so slightly brighter. _'Naruto … Was this you?'_ She didn't bother to waste any more time and with a quick shot of chakra she fired herself back into the forest, taking a bite of the still steaming fish.

-TSHL-

"HOW THE FUCK COULD YOU 'MISPLACE' THE SCROLL!" Sasuke was livid as he yelled at Naruto again, the blonde hung his head and didn't reply. Sasuke had been awake for just over an hour and had spent the better part of that hour shouting at the blonde. The pink haired girl and silver haired boy only watched on from the sidelines and occasionally tried to remind Sasuke that they were on a time limit.

"Don't you think you should be telling him that!" he pointed accusingly at Naruto when Kabuto tried to tell them that they should get moving. "He's the one who thought it'd be great idea to play hide and seek with the Scroll!" Naruto looked like he was about to say something in response, but didn't get the chance as Sasuke took off into the forest before anybody could respond. "Hurry up, you idiots! We've got to find a new fucking scroll now!" The three remaining genin only shared a look before taking off after the Uchiha, Sakura cast a curious look over to Naruto and asked the question which had been burning inside her for the last few hours.

"Is there something you're not telling us, Naruto?"

"What? No, of course not." The blonde mentally cursed himself for answering too quickly. Sakura's eyes narrowed.

"You know, I heard a yell last night, what was it?" The blondes eyes flashed, in concern for a second before returning to normal.

"I … stubbed my toe, that's all. Yeah! When I was taking a leak, remember?" He scratched the back of his head in embarrassment and laughed awkwardly, hoping that his teammate would buy into his lie. Sakura's gaze didn't shift.

"It sounded like a girl." He laughed louder and more awkwardly in response.

"Haha, Sakura! You're so mean for mocking my scream." The girl opened her mouth to speak again but before she could a wave of chakra rippled through the forest. The hairs on her arms and neck bristled at the animosity it held, she felt its choking strength envelope her for a second before she acclimatised to it and drew in a shaky breath. She sent a look at both Naruto and Kabuto who both cast their heads in the direction the chakra seemed to indicate.

"That's where Sasuke went, right?" Sakura felt fear pump through her like blood as she thought of Sasuke fighting the source of such a foul chakra alone. "We have to go and help him, now!" The two boys shared a look and Naruto nodded confidently, Kabuto looked slightly less sure but nodded as well.

Less than a few seconds passed before the trio came across the raven haired boy, keeled over onto his hands and knees breathing heavily. Sakura's eyes widened as she identified Sasuke as the source of the chakra … that seal. Her mind rushed as she began to approach the downed teammate, she was shocked to find that someone had stopped her from getting closer, she looked behind her to see Kabuto holding her back by her shoulder. She began to say something but he merely gestured for her to look ahead, she saw Naruto walking slowly toward Sasuke. A strangled cry from the Uchiha made the blonde halt his progress for a second but he started his advance again just as quickly once the cry passed. She saw thick purple chakra ooze from the cracks between her Teammates fingers as they were clamped over the seal on his neck, it seemed to react to Naruto because when the boy leaned forward to touch it, it seemed to lunge out at him. He backed away swiftly out of range and began to circle around until he came face to face with Sasuke.

The boy began to pant and strain as the seal glowed a bright red and then screamed in agony as glowing red patterns seemed to grow from the seal and move across Sasuke's body and under his clothes. Naruto narrowed his eyes and moved closer to his teammate again, raising his hand as if to touch the oozing purple mess again, this time however the chakra shied away from his touch and began to retract back to where it came from inside the seal. Leaving the glowing red marks covering just over half of Sasuke's face. Then a hiss resounded around the Uchiha and the red marks seemed to steam simultaneously and change from red into a jet black like the original seal was. Sasuke threw back his head and screamed in pain, horror, and in pure animalistic hatred, and rage.

-TSHL-

Kin kicked off of a branch and fell into pace behind Zaku who nodded at her, and then acknowledged the scroll she flashed at him. Dosu caught a glimpse of it out of the corner of his eye and nodded in Kin's direction too, she thought to herself that it was as close to a greeting as she would get from there two. A second passed while the three manoeuvred themselves into their normal formation and then a shriek passed through the trees, Zaku turned to face its direction and then looked at Dosu.

"It seems that we've found our target, we'll engage team seven Asap." Dosu spoke under his wrappings and pulled his loose jacket down to cover his melody arm. Kin glanced nervously from the direction Sasuke's scream had come and then to her team.

"Wait a second." The two other members of the team exchanged a look before looking at her expectantly. "Sasuke has a curse mark." Both boys shared another look, filled primarily with fear, then Zaku glanced back at Kin.

"You're sure?" Dosu scoffed.

"Of course she's sure, she wouldn't mention it otherwise." Kin nodded at Dosu,

"Orochimaru-sama told me himself." Dosu shook his head loosely then cast a concerned look over to Zaku.

"We don't have a choice here, we all know that don't we?" Zaku nodded in response and Dosu cast his single eye back over to Kin. "What else did Orochimaru-sama say?" she shook her head and took a breath before speaking.

"I- I don't think he expects us to survive." She said with her voice cracking slightly, she let out a harsh laugh, "I guess that explains why he let us into the exam, huh! We're far from the best genin, he just wanted us to test the curse mark!" Zaku back pedalled slightly as Kin spoke and looked between his two teammates who looked equally distraught. He shook his head a few times and growled.

"Fuck that Uchiha! We'll tear his fuckin' head off and show Orochimaru-sama we're not useless. Yeah?" Dosu nodded and began to move in the direction of Sasuke's scream,

"We may as well do this now, you agree?" his two teammates nodded and took up positions either side of him. Kin coughed into her palm to get their attention once again, Dosu nodded at her to continue.

"I should probably say, they're actually travelling in a group of four, not three." Zaku grimaced at the information before forcing a confident smirk.

"More fun for us, right man?" The spiky haired boy gave Dosu a punch in the arm as he spoke, thought the only response he got was a low growl.

The three were moving swiftly through the forest when the first waves of Malevolent chakra hit them, first chokingly obvious and then it died into the back ground of their mind. Dosu brought the group to a halt in front of a large clearing. Then turned and looked at each teammate in turn, "It would seem that Kin was right about the curse mark. We'll stage our offensive here in this clearing, the open area will allow for maximum devastation with your air cannons, Zaku." The other boy nodded and ran a finger over said cannons in anticipation of the coming fight. "When- If it becomes obvious that we don't stand a chance against them … We'll need a distraction, there's no sense in all three of us dying when only one has to." As Dosu spoke, Zaku gained a slightly guilty expression and cast Kin an apologetic look.

-TSHL-

**I don't think that I changed much in this section, just expanded it. I have tried to make Dosu and Zaku more believable though, I don't want them to be evil for evils sake. I want them to be more realistic, have moments where you think that they're just two guys. Cause let's face it, they are really. I do feel kind of bad for making Sasuke such a cock, but it is relevant to the story now and later. It is for plot purposes … not just bashing.**

**The next chapter is something I'm looking forward to writing though, the fight between Team Seven and Team Sound! What will Naruto do when he's pitted against Kin, or visa versa? Exciting stuff, man.**


	4. The Forest of Death Part Four

**LAST TIME!**

**Kin and Naruto had, like a lovers spat or something. But you know what! They learned each other's names, that's right folks ONLY three chapters and they already learn names. So then after that Kin did another ninja escape with jutsu and decided to sleep in some bushes! Guess who found her in the night though, our fave blonde did of course! And he gave her his Heaven Scroll, cue the 'awws'. But of course Naruto's team was a bit angry about the scroll going walkabout but it didn't last long cause then Sasuke went all SUPER SAIAN and the cursemark finally activated, just in time for the fight against Team sound!**

-TSHL-

Birds exploded from the high trees as Sasuke's scream of rage and pain spread through the forest, the blonde ninja who had been the closest to him instinctively backed away with a look of fear and suspicion. The malevolent feel of the chakra was still thick in the air as Sakura began a slow approach toward the boy shaking off Kabuto who made another attempt to stop her from getting closer.

"S-Sasuke?" he lifted his head as his name was spoken to reveal two fully developed sharingan staring uncomfortably back at the pink haired girl, she flinched involuntarily at the sight. "Are you, you know, alright?" He ignored her in favour of looking at each of his palms as if fascinated by them before examining the dark markings that were sprawled across the left one. He touched one gently and then a second later pulled up his sleeve to see that the marks continued up, a smile twisted across his features as his clenched his fists and began to gather chakra. Naruto furrowed his brow at this point, Sasuke had a lot of chakra he knew that but the way he was flaring it now was disturbingly high.

"Hey, Sasuke what the hell just happened?" The boy turned at the sound of Naruto's voice and met his gaze, but the blonde refused to flinch as Sakura had.

"DeadLast." Sasuke spoke in his normal bored tone, only the smirk dancing at the edges of his lips showed how different he really was. But Naruto bristled at the name and allowed his brows to mould into an angry expression, "Fight me." The smirk on Sasuke's lips formed fully as Narutos eyes grew a fraction in shock, Sakura moved closer and gently clung onto one of Sasuke's arms obvious fear evident in her expression. This couldn't be Sasuke, that seal must've done something. His voice was just too different, suddenly so hollow and … dark.

"Sasuke … Not now, we can't do this now." Naruto's voice was deceptively calm as he spoke. "After all you need to rest after … Whatever the hell it was that just happened." Sasuke scoffed and removed Sakura from his arm, then pointed accusingly at Naruto.

"You actually think you're my equal don't you!" a furious expression crossed both boys faces as the words passed Sasuke's lips. Naruto shifted his weight from one leg to the other as he leaned forward,

"You're damn right I do!" the raven haired boy laughed harshly and flared his chakra further, spreading his hands before him in victory he smirked at the blonde who's stance faltered at the sheer intensity and darkness of the chakra. Suddenly the chakra stopped spiking and Sasuke turned his head to face toward the tower in the distance, the twisted smile he wore grew further.

"Someone's coming." Kabuto cast Naruto a sympathetic look before turning to Sasuke,

"We can avoid them, you will need to rest soon. We don't know what that seal does, it could be charging up to explode for all we know." Sasuke showed no reaction to Kabuto's words, and only muttered under his breath before firing himself into the forest toward the three chakra signals he'd detected. Naruto let a shaky breath pass before turning to a paling Sakura.

"What did the teme say?" it was Kabuto who replied with a shake of his head.

"Maybe they have a Heaven Scroll." He recited.

-TSHL-

Kin shuddered involuntarily as the chakra source began to approach her and her team, she glanced to each of them to find a carefully constructed mask of apathy in place upon both faces. Only she, their teammate could see the tiny flaws that betrayed how scared they really were, she silently hoped that her own mask was as convincing.

"Remember the plan, this is the first time he's activated the seal. I'm guessing he won't be used to it and more importantly he won't be able to control it, we make it quick and brutal. The longer this drags on for the more time he has to adjust." Dosu's voice was calm and completely level throughout, there was nothing in his tone or beat that gave away his fear. She noticed that it made her feel better, and Zaku straightened his back slightly more before nodding. Maybe on a subconscious level it had given Zaku and herself a small amount of morale to hear such a calm voice in their situation.

"You got it Dosu, quick and brutal." She smirked at how level her own voice was and she felt her confidence swell.

"We'll wipe the floor with him." Zaku added as he crossed his hands over his chest. The three shared a smile before a sound echoed through the clearing, instantly recognised by each as someone using the trees to travel. They moved subtly into guard positions that still screamed relaxed to an observer, their muscles all coiled and ready to explode in movement without a breaths notice. Sasuke landed on the opposite side of the clearing in a crouched position a few meters short of the forest now behind him.

"Impressive! He found us already!" Zaku taunted with a large smile on his face, he clapped his hands a few times whilst he appeared to bite back a laugh, Sasuke had no reaction to the mockery and rose from his position on one knee. Smirking all the time, then he blasted the area with dark chakra, the three sound genin couldn't hide their reactions completely as it engulfed the area and each flinched very slightly only to be picked up by the blood red eyes staring them down.

"So it's true, huh? Otogakure really is insignificant if this is the best they have to offer." Kin felt her confidence vent from her system like steam from a kettle. A subtle glance at Zaku showed that the Uchiha's words had had a similar effect on him as his back hunched over ever so slightly, she narrowed her eyes and returned her focus to the enemy across from her. If they were going to stand a chance they would need to act soon, quick and brutal!

Kin launched herself forward like an arrow out of a bow, skipping across the clearing covering meters in each stride. She heard Dosu yell after her in shock.

"Don't break formation!" It was too late, obviously but the sounds of her teammates following her helped her regain some tiny amount of morale and pushed forward in her attack. The Uchiha leant forward and widened his stance, Taijutsu was obviously a strong field for him. She had only one trick which could gain her a low blow against him. _'No honour amongst thieves.'_ She kicked off of the ground and sent herself higher into the air, skirting over the boys head within a half second she touched down and armed herself with senbon, preparing herself to turn on her heel and block. She was hoping he'd take her as bait, an enemy singled from their team facing away within a few paces of him, all he had to do was turn and take her down. Then Dosu and Zaku bringing up the rear would have an open shot. She turned.

Dosu landed next to her with a furious expression, Zaku a beat behind with an exasperated look. She mentally sighed, the Uchiha obviously wasn't as much of an idiot as she'd been hoping. She glared at said ninja, now stood on the other side of the clearing with an expression somewhere between confusion and disappointment.

"What was that, some kind of bull rush strategy?" Kin could tell that Sasuke had more to say but was cut off by Dosu.

"The time for talk has passed, Uchiha." And with that the mummified boy dashed forward to be taken over a second later by Zaku who took the central position. Kin brought up the rear and readied her senbon. Sasuke's face hardened and he fell into defence as Zaku met him hard with a pair of kunai knives, Sasuke drew his own and the two clashed. Whilst the two fought to overpower each other Dosu came in from the side and swung with his melody arm, Sasuke dodged backward out of Zaku's reach and dodged Dosu's swipe. Only to falter when he landed harder on one side, he looked unsure for a second before remembering there was a third enemy. Kin had already sent her senbon flying through the air and made contact with the cross guard Sasuke had brought up to protect his torso, the bells chimed and he suddenly felt his chakra drop as he lost control for a second. He dispelled the genjutsu Kin had placed and prepared to return fire, only for his danger sense to kick in, he glanced at Zaku to see the boy had stretched out both of his palms in his direction. Instinctively he gathered his chakra to his legs to jump away but found that his control still wasn't completely stable. He closed his eyes and prepared to take the blow.

"Zankūha!" The blast from Zaku's air cannons easily ripped the boy off of the ground and sent him spinning through the trees before thudding into one with a harsh crack. Dosu's eyes widened in anticipation and raced out of the clearing in the direction Sasuke had been sent, both Kin and Zaku followed without a word.

The three relaxed slightly when they found the boy leaning against the bottom of the tree he'd hit, his head hanging limply. Kin froze, then brought up her guard only in time to remove the force of a kick that sent her skidding back into the clearing. She climbed to her feet as quickly as she could to see Sasuke engaging, and overpowering both of her teammates. Before she could move to give them aid the two were also sent backwards into the clearing, she brought a kunai out and held it in a guard. Sasuke dashed forward with a savage grin and moved around the slash Kin made in the air before bringing a fist up to catch her in the stomach. She felt vomit rise in her throat as the boy twisted his fist mercilessly whilst physically lifting her from the ground. She clamped a hand on either side of his forearm and used her hold to manoeuvre herself, she straightened her leg behind her and then lifted herself off of the boys fist. She felt the gravity behind her leg turn her body, then used all the strength she could muster to bring her leg under herself and into the Uchiha's face.

The boy toppled backwards and released the girl who landed limply on the floor, the punch to her gut had done a lot more damage then she would care to admit, but she struggled to her feet and cast a bitter glare at the raven haired boy who was climbing to his feet as well.

"You could've got him then, you know." Kin suddenly felt fear wash over her, there was only two reasons why Zaku and Dosu wouldn't push an advantage like that. One was that they had been killed, or were unconscious, the other reason was that they had ran. She turned her head and suddenly felt lightheaded, she blinked a few times hoping that what she was seeing was wrong.

The clearing was empty.

-TSHL-

"What do you mean, 'Wait.' We can't leave him alone, did you see him just now?" Naruto growled out at the boy who was now holding his palms up defensively.

"I did see him, Naruto-kun, that's exactly why I'm saying we be cautious." He pointed in the direction Sasuke had left seconds before, "That seal on his neck is dangerous, you both saw how it changed his personality. We can't realistically know what other affects there might be, if we go after him now." The boy shook his head and crossed his arms over his chest. "We'd be placing ourselves very carefully in the path of a very real danger. Are you forgetting that seal was placed by an enemy, I don't think they'd have given him a power boost when they could have just as easily delivered a poison." Naruto sniffed and turned away from the boy, but inside his head he was thinking through what the older boy was saying. Everything he was saying was true, but why did Sasuke get a power boost then, was it an accident. After a moment he brushed his hand through his hair and sighed.

"He's our teammate, Kabuto. We have to go after him, but I understand why you won't come too." The blonde looked at Sakura long enough to see the girl nod then returned to Kabuto. The older boy sighed and nodded.

"Okay, but I'm not letting you go alone. You two follow me now." He smiled at the blonde and turned to face the forest, "We'll need to go slightly slower than normal to track him, I don't trust a chakra signal that large to be accurate." Naruto was about to ask what the silver haired boy meant before he fired off into the trees. The blonde boy followed, and a second behind him Sakura met his pace. She wore the same confused expression showing she didn't understand the meaning behind Kabuto's words either. Naruto found himself infuriated with the pace Kabuto set very quickly and dashed alongside the genin.

"We won't catch him at this rate, he'll be gaining too much ground that any fight would be over before we meet him." Kabuto gave his a side long look and forced a smile.

"We'll find him Naruto-kun, don't worry." Sakura nodded to herself at Kabuto's words, they would find Sasuke, of course they would! With a growl Naruto bolted ahead at a much greater pace, Sakura began to shout after the blonde before Kabuto cut her off. "Let him go, he'll head straight for the chakra spike and we'll follow the trail, one of us will find him, and hopefully we won't be too late." The girl looked off as Naruto disappeared into the foliage and hardened her nerve, right now she had to trust her teammates to look after themselves.

-TSHL-

Naruto landed on a tree branch at the edge of a large clearing and felt his lungs empty of air in shock. He gasped again causing the two in the clearing to look in his direction, in a second he left his perch and descended to ground level then jogged into the clearing. Sasuke stared back, Kin did too although with a terrified expression. Naruto stopped a few meters short of the two and subtly glanced around, the entire area was flooded with the malevolent chakra Sasuke was expelling but he forced himself to focus. The first thing he took notice of was Kin, the sound girl he had saved only 12 hours previously was lying in the dirt and had obviously been the victim of a brutal beating. Blood leaked from her mouth and from above her left brow, it cascaded down her face and neck, staining her combat scarf and vest with blood. A bandage around her upper arm and shoulder was stained the same deep red and showed several senbon needles protruding from it at painful angles, it took him a second to rip his eyes from the sight to further examine the girl for injuries. He winced at what he saw, then felt anger pump through his system.

"Sa-Sasuke …" The boys voice was a lot quieter than he'd meant it to be, "Sasuke!" The boy in question tilted his head and dropped the senbon he'd been holding. He stalked towards the boy with obvious confidence in his gait, he ignored the girl who immediately began to try to move away from him, wailing in pain as she did.

"What do you want now, dobe?" Naruto pointed at Kin,

"What the hell is this, teme! It's torture!" Naruto couldn't help but look back to the girls left leg. The needles had obviously been driven in by hand, the amount of care put into positioning them had made the blonde boy gulp, all five of the needles had been pushed around her knee cap as if ready to leaver the bone out of its place and the entire limb was the same red as her bandage and scarf, he tore his eyes from it and glared at the Uchiha.

"Oh boo hoo! She's an enemy, baka!" Sasuke threw his arms out in emphasis then turned and walked back towards the girl now clawing her way through the dirt dragging her brutally damaged leg, leaving a trail of gore behind her. She screamed in pain and fear as she felt her hair being tugged backward and allowed more tears to flow down her cheeks, creating twin channels of clean skin where around it lay only blood.

"Did I say you could fucking move!?" He gathered an amount of saliva in his mouth and spat on the girl before tossing her carelessly back into the clearing, enjoying the squeal of agony as her leg thudded into the dirt.

"Sasuke! This is fucking crazy, look at her! I'm not going to let you carry on!" the blonde ran between the two and spread his arms protectively in front of the girl, barely managing to restrain the pure rage that seemed to be gathering in his gut. He glanced over his shoulder at Kin who was staring at him with wide unblinking eyes, the rage seemed to dissipate slightly and he gave her a gentle nod which she didn't return.

-TSHL-

She couldn't believe what had just happened, she had been so close to death that she could feel it poking at the edge of her vision but now, this blonde Vessel had given her yet another chance to survive a little longer. She wouldn't waste it. She ignored the Uchiha as he began to speak to Naruto and shot her hands down to her knee and hissed as she gripped the needles that were protruding out, she breathed out and tugged without mercy at the one furthest inside her leg. She screamed violently then bit down on her lip until she could feel the metal taste fill her mouth, still she pulled until she felt it loosen and fall limp.

-TSHL-

"You really think you could match me, dobe?" Naruto's vision refilled with the rage he'd felt deplete slightly when he looked at Kin, then turned to face the Uchiha who held an unmistakably smug expression on his face. "You're nothing but a deadlast, baka. Remember it!" He barked with laughter as he mocked the boys old catch phrase, then held a kunai out in one arm, pointed threateningly at Naruto. "If you think you could stop me, deadlast, try it." His voice was suddenly serious, and Naruto knew that the boy in front of him meant to come at him with everything he had. He hung his head and sighed, feeling tears beginning to brim in his eyes he rubbed at them for a second.

"Like I said, teme. I won't let you hurt her." Sasuke's smirk faded slightly and he sank into a crouch, then without another word between them, the two boys dashed across the clearing toward one another, kunai knives trailing behind them with obvious intent.

-TSHL-

**And that's The Forest of Death Part 4 done! I hate that this chapter is so short but the one I'm writing from was only 900 words, 3000 is over three times! I should be proud, I think, should I? You tell me. **


	5. The Forest of Death Part Five

**LAST TIME!**

**Not that much happened really, I'm skimming over it now and … Okay, well LAST TIME! Sasuke's curse mark showed itself and then Sasuke went, like, MEGA douche on everyone and was calling people names, picking fights, he was disgraceful really. Anyway after he ran away from Team Seven + Kabuto he started a fight with Team Dosu being all like "U all suk lol." And then they were like D: But then Kin dashed over and did some trick thing? It didn't work though and Sasuke beat the SHIT out of her and her team, then Zaku and Dosu ran away and left Kin! How harsh is that? **

**Then Naruto came along and was all sassy like "Dude, this is well out of order." Sasuke wasn't having any of that though, and then the two were like, FIGHTT. Who wins? Let's find out …**

-TSHL-

Naruto grunted as the two boys met in the centre of the clearing, he had known Sasuke had received some kind of power boost from that seal but what the boy was showing him now was beyond any expectation he'd had for it. He felt his eyebrows twitch as Sasuke swiftly began to overpower him and push the clashing blades towards his gut, with a grunt he pushed his kunai downward bringing Sasuke's with it and simultaneously jumped over his teammate. As Naruto landed on the floor behind Sasuke he felt his danger sense flare and immediately made an action to dodge, too late, Sasuke had brought his kunai down in an arc driven by the momentum Naruto had given him when he'd pushed downward and spun around to slash directly behind him. Naruto cried out as blood splattered across the floor of the clearing, he heard Kin cry out in concern but flashed a disarming smile and applied pressure to the shallow cut. It was a lucky escape and he knew it, if he'd been an inch or so closer to Sasuke then the cut would have been game changing. He settled into a defensive stance as Sasuke mimicked him, warily the boys shifted their weight around though slightly more cautious than before on Naruto's part.

A heartbeat later Sasuke closed the distance with a flash of chakra to aid his speed, and skipped under the swing Naruto lashed out with. His eyes widened however when he saw Naruto's knee approaching his face and brought up his hands on instinct to take the force out of the blow, which still sent him rolling backwards a short distance. Pressing his advantage Naruto kicked off of the ground and formed a hand seal in midair.

"Kage Bunshin no jutsu!" four sets of feet landed around the downed Uchiha and each quickly closed in grabbing a limb each, hauling Sasuke off of the ground and holding him suspended in the air. Sasuke was confused for a second as he looked around to be blinded by the sun above him, his eyes widened in shock as it was blotted out, above him a fifth Naruto was descending at incredible speeds. He drove chakra to his legs and coiled them with all of his strength to pull the two blondes holding them off balance which made it significantly easier to move his legs, he then kicked out with his right leg and burst the Naruto who turned out to be a clone and straight away used the same leg to spin across and destroy the other clone. With his legs free Sasuke was able to flip his body around and use an axe kick to destroy one of the clones holding his arms. As this happened the other Naruto let go of his arm and made a motion to tackle the Uchiha. Who easily dodged out of the way while the blonde collided with the floor heavily, revealing it to be a clone. Sasuke reset his guard position and returned his sights to the sky, just in time to see Naruto slam into the ground where he had been held.

Naruto growled in annoyance as he watched his clones getting destroyed as if they were nothing and knew he was in trouble, as soon as he landed he would be vulnerable to attack. He shifted his weight in midair to make it so he landed on his feet instead of on his elbow as he'd planned to hit the other boy. As he impacted with the ground a thick layer of dust and leaf litter was thrown into the air, hiding his position, he bent his knees and absorbed the impact allowing him to dodge backward swiftly. As he did he heard a kunai whiz past and he widened his eyes in shock when he felt it skim across his cheek, he stared after it for a second before staring at Sasuke who held his hand out in the position he'd thrown it from. _'If I hadn't dodged back then … He's really trying to kill me.'_

Sasuke stared back whilst his mind reeled, had he really meant to kill Naruto then? A voice he'd tried to forget echoed in the back of his mind as his thoughts began to get away from him. _'To get eyes like mine, you'll need to commit an evil act. You'll need to kill your best friend.'_ Sasuke hardened his gaze and once again lunged forward, catching the still gawping Uzumaki off guard with a savage kick to the gut which lifted him off of the ground.

Naruto grunted in pain as he was lifted off of the ground and then thudded against the earth, he let a choked cough out with a little blood then slowly climbed to his feet, glancing around for the Uchiha.

"It's over, Naruto." The blonde's eyes widened as the voice came from directly behind him, then he felt a hand roughly grip his jacket cuff and haul him off of the ground and into a throw, He spiralled through the air like a missile for a few seconds, watching the clearing disappear with Sasuke and Kin. The former suddenly looked a lot darker and Naruto realised the black marks that once covered half of the boy now covered his whole body. He let out a pained gasp as he thudded heavily into a tree and felt fear wash over him as he saw Sasuke approaching from the distance.

"Naruto!" His breath caught in his throat as he cast a look to his side, Sakura stood on a low branch with Kabuto just behind her both wearing shocked expressions. Then a thud in front of him, he turned fearfully to see Sasuke looming over him.

"Sasuke? What are you doing?" The boy ignored Sakura question in favour of picking a now hissing Naruto by his collar and once again launching him into the air, this time via a kick. Sasuke's blood red eyes sparked at the muscle memory and repeated Lee's lotus allowing the Uchiha to ascend in an arc behind the blonde, he smirked for a second then delivered another kick to Naruto's back which issued the sickening crack of bones and scream from Sakura who watched in horror as Naruto was fired back through the tree's and into the clearing. Sasuke spared a look over his shoulder and glanced at the two genin now staring at him with utter terror, and in Kabuto's case, disgust before approaching the clearing once again.

-TSHL-

Naruto cried out as he bolted upright from his position on the floor, a second after he realised that he was in fact still alive he glanced around and furrowed his brow. It was like nowhere that he'd seen before, an enormous tunnel that looked similar to a cave system but lined with concrete and pipes as thick as his torso. He stared around himself and quickly summed up that he was no longer in the forest, but then where? He climbed to his feet and wiped the water from his hands onto his jumpsuit.

"Hello?" He wasn't sure if he expected or even wanted a response but felt the need to make his own presence known. In the darkness he sensed something enormous move at the sound of his voice and he glanced nervously around himself and into the dark. "Hello!" Again the enormous thing moved and slowly a form came into view, a barred gate as large as the front gates of the village seemed to manifest out of the darkness before an even larger form appeared behind them. The darkness hid the creature from view but Naruto could easily make out its malevolent eyes and its great tails swinging behind it, for the first time in his life Naruto truly felt fear for his life as he identified the creature as the Kyuubi.

He stumbled backward a few steps as he stared up in awe of the creature's sheer size.

"**Humans are all the same, after all." **The great beast seemed to summarise the entire human history in a single statement after rolling its huge eye over the blonde in front of the gate. The boy opened and closed his mouth a few times in apparent fear before collecting enough courage to even speak.

"H-How did you get out of the seal!" His voice gained confidence and volume as he spoke, but the beast only tilted his head in response before a rumbling which may have been a laugh filled the tunnel. Naruto looked about himself as the rumble echoed around him and repeated itself into inexistence.

"**Stupid human! This place is inside of that accursed seal." **The boy gained a look of confusion and it became apparent that the boy didn't have knowledge of mindscapes. The beast narrowed his eyes and lowered his head to meet the boys gaze, for better or worse this _specimen_ was his vessel. **"Do you know why you're in this place?"** Naruto gained a far off expression for a second before suddenly shouting in response.

"Did I die! Did Sasuke kill me!?" The beast barked for silence and was obeyed instantly

"**You are here because **_**I**_** saved you. My chakra is currently repairing your pathetic body like it has every single damn time you damaged it through your ridiculous decisions." **Naruto stared hard at the beast for a second before lowering his head, he caught the implication that the beast made, without him then Naruto would have died already, maybe dozens of times. **"This time it might not be enough to simply repair your body, that **_**teammate**_** of yours is out for blood." **Naruto's head snapped back up at the mention of Sasuke.

"What do I have to do then? I have to protect Kin, I have to!" His stare would have been uncomfortably intense for any other creature but the Kyuubi returned it without any sign of discomfort.

"**Simple," **The beast chimed from within the dark. **"You only need to remove the seal before you and my chakra will flow directly into your system." **Naruto looked around himself and narrowed his eyes,

"Can't you send through chakra without removing the seal … You said you'd been repairing my body with it!" The beast lashed out against the cage door causing Naruto to dart backwards in fear.

"**This seal leeches my power from me to repair you. Don't you DARE think I would save your miserable existence!" **The beast growled out through clenched teeth, Naruto again dropped his head to stare at the floor.

"I can't release the seal, if I do then you would be released, wouldn't you?" The tails of the beast stopped spiralling behind him as the boy spoke and the Kyuubi gained an expression of slight confusion.

"**You would give your life to see that I remain sealed?"** Naruto seemed to run over the thought for a second before nodding slowly. A second rumble filled the tunnel before the beast spoke again.** "What a terribly misguided view you must have for your world to see it as worth protecting." ** With a swipe of one of its tails a small amount of blood red liquid was thrown through the gaps in the cage and fell around the blonde. **"That is the best I can offer, though I think it will be more than enough if you can catch the Uchiha off guard."** With a second swipe of its tail the blonde was sent reeling from his mindscape and into reality.

-TSHL-

Kin felt her throat clench painfully tight when Naruto skidded into the clearing, creating a shallow trench as he did. She had expected him to climb out and flash her another smile, a thumbs up maybe but he didn't. She could see his blonde hair just over the rim of the dirt fluttering carelessly in the light breeze, he wasn't moving though and she sensed it wasn't just because he was unconscious. She closed her eyes for a second in an attempt to regain control of her emotions, but it only allowed the tears she hadn't known were gathering to fall and as she felt them trail down her cheeks she fell to them and began to cry.

"Get up Naruto!" her voice waved franticly as she clawed at the dirt and began to drag herself across the clearing, not paying any mind to the two senbon still inside her leg.

"Shut up, fool." Her body froze at the sound of Sasuke's voice and she cast a wary eye in his direction, she shuddered as he came close but he simply walked straight past her and toward the trench that Naruto now lay in. Her body screamed at her to do something, anything to save the blonde but she found the Uchiha's aura to be completely overpowering and suffocating, especially now that the markings had spread to cover his entire body. She quietly sobbed to herself and prayed for a miracle.

"Sasuke-kun." The raven haired boy stopped his approach toward Naruto and turned to face the new arrival in the clearing, Kin's fear doubled as the voice reached her ears and she silently pressed her body as close to the floor as possible as if hoping that she would simply pass through it in order to escape. "I'm glad to see you're using my Cursed Seal." Sasuke raised his head in a nod as he examined the Grass nin before him leaning carelessly against a tree a few dozen yards away. He silently went over the fight he'd had with her before and summarised that even now he would be outmatched by her, he chose instantly to try and keep her talking.

"Who are you, really? You're not a genin." The grass nin tilted her head playfully and brought a hand up to her face as if shying away from his view.

"Are you sure you want to know?" the boy only nodded, trusting that the genin could still see him. A chuckle sounded through the clearing as Sakura and Kabuto entered with Sakura calling out to Sasuke.

"Sasuke! Stop it!" the latter was immediately set on guard by the presence of two enemies, the former by the presence of one. The grass genin removed the straw hat upon her head and sent a smile slightly too wide toward the audience, "Very well, Sasuke-kun." The voice shifted tones noticeably as the creature spoke and gently settled on a more masculine voice. They then began to slowly, but forcibly remove the skin from their face as Sakura and Kabuto watched in horror. "I'm sure you'll recognise my name when I tell you, and you're right I'm no genin. In fact …" The man threw his head back to reveal a pale face with deep purple tints framing demonic yellow eyes, "I'm a sannin. Orochimaru." Sakura took a wary step back before falling onto her hind and silently began to cry to herself in fear of the intent Orochimaru sent at her, the man simply tossed a twisted smile her way before focusing on Sasuke once again. "You'll seek me out Sasuke-kun, this is but a taste of the power I can offer you." He smirked as he cast an eye toward the shuddering blonde and then back to Sasuke, _'Time to make he feel powerless.'_

The boy stepped forward and opened his mouth as if he was about to speak, but the snake sannin simply melted into the bark of the tree he was leaning against and within a second was gone. Sasuke shook himself for a second and began to feel the power ebb away, he examined his hands and arms to see the marks draw back across his skin toward the seal.

"What the-" He observed them for a second before deciding it didn't matter much anymore and cast a glance at Naruto, his eyes widened.

Blood red eyes returned his stare and Sasuke felt fear pump through his system as the seal once again became inactive. Kin lifted her head as the suddenly much more intense chakra that washed over the area, she wasn't sure if she was happy or sad right now to see Naruto sitting up. She could tell instantly that this chakra was of demonic origin, the way it ripped at, and engulfed her wasn't at all like human chakra, or any chakra she'd ever sensed. She held herself back from running and silently observed as Naruto cast her a glance then suddenly gained a furious expression and exploded in movement advancing toward the Uchiha. Sasuke had no time even to put up a guard as Naruto battered into him and cast him against a boulder, knocking him out instantly. Kin watched in confused horror as Naruto's eyes switched back to their blue shade, then just as instantly he seemed to be deserted of his strength like a puppet with his strings cut, the blonde simply fell to his knees.

The two made eye contact for a second as Naruto fell flat onto the dirt, he raised a brow in confusion. Why did she look so worried, she was making her way toward him with an extremely frantic expression on her face. She was even crying, he noticed it then, he couldn't hear her either. He looked to her lips and saw them moving, she was talking to him, or trying to … He tried to comfort her but found to his confusion he couldn't move either, he sighed to himself as his vision faded into darkness … _'Am I dying?'_

-TSHL-

**Another short one today, sorry folks but I do have another treat for you! A drawing of Kin facing off against the Boar from chapter one! Can be seen here:**

/art/The-Forest-of-Death-405933708

**Okay, so I'm not 100% sure about adding Orochimaru to this sequence but I think it works nicely in the end, Sasuke is cast aside easily by Kyuubi Naruto which make him feel weak. (It was implied that Orochimaru was the one to stop the seal from activating.) Which makes it more likely that Sasuke will join him, you're a sneaky one, Mr Snake.**


	6. The Forest of Death Part Six

**LAST TIME! **

**Sasuke was like, 'Dude you're a shit' and beat the piss out of Naruto, but then Naruto was like, 'Hey whats this fox doing here?' and the Kyuubi was like 'Lemme out, dude!'. But Naruto was having none of it and was all stubborn like. While that was happening though Orochimaru came out the trees and scared the panties off of Kin and Sakura, but Sasuke was like IDGAF and asked stupid questions. THEN Naruto woke up all demonified and beat the turd out of Sasuke. But… Where did Kabuto go? Only I know so far ;)**

-TSHL-

Kin stared forward, her eyes wide in shock and her brows drawing together in confusion. She stared at the blond in front of her lying face down in the dirt where he fell a moment before, blood slowly leaking out of his mouth and pooling into a puddle of gore slowly growing around his paling form.

A moment before he'd been bathed in an orange aura as sinister as the Otokage's own, but in place of the icy prickle her masters had the blonde's aura was boiling to the point that air around him seemed to ripple in the heat. Then he had looked at her and the entirety of his fury was placed upon her for a heartbeat, before his suddenly furious face was set upon the Uchiha. Then he vanished in a bolt of orange chakra and delivered an unforgiving tackle which hurtled the raven haired boy against an exposed boulder, issuing the savage crack of bones. Then the aura left him. The strength fleeted from his body as if he'd never had any to begin with, and he slipped to his knees. That was when her eye's had widened, she'd felt the power he'd possessed pulse through the clearing then it was gone, and he fell forward onto his chest. She felt tears begin to pool in her eyes and they began to blur her vision as blood started to leak from his mouth and the two made eye contact.

"N-Naruto? Are you okay?" She watched his brow furrow very slightly in confusion and the light behind his eyes dull, she realised that he'd either not heard her or wasn't able to focus on her words at all. She swallowed the saliva building in her throat at the implication, then shouted at him. "Naruto! Naruto? What's wrong, what happened?" The boy gave no response and she felt fear gnaw at her from deep inside her gut, causing her chest to tighten and her breath to become shallow. She began to drag herself towards him, her leg throbbing painfully as she dragged it behind her, she gritted her teeth and turned the pain into strength. She could see the question in his waning eyes, he didn't know what was happening… But the fear in them told her that he suspected he was dying. In a second Kin cast a look toward the pink haired girl across the clearing who seemed to be in shock and growled at her.

"PINKY! Stop freaking out and help him!" She slammed her fist into the dirt and continued dragging herself toward the blonde, he couldn't die. He'd defeated that Boar, He'd made her smile, given her the scroll … He understood _that_ feeling. That rejection from life, but he fought it so hard… he COULDN'T die, she hadn't ever thanked him for saving her. "You hear me blondie! You can't die yet!" The sound of her own voice gave her strength and began to claw through the dirt faster than before. "Do it Pinky!"

Sakura blinked herself out of the trance she'd been sent into and began to take deep breaths, allowing herself to think clearly for the first time since the sannin had left the clearing. The Sound girl was right, she needed to make sure Sasuke was alright. She had seen Naruto climb out of the crater he'd landed in and then with speed and strength she hadn't known he'd possessed he cast Sasuke aside as if he were a civilian child, hurtling him against a rock raising a bone crunching sound. She shook her head and scowled to herself, what was Naruto thinking attacking his teammate like that? She ran across the clearing and skidded to a halt in the shadow of the boulder Sasuke had hit and withdrew her medical equipment. Kin's glowered at the girl in annoyance as she ran toward the Uchiha.

"Not him! Save Naruto, save the blonde!" Kin barked as she again savagely beat the ground with her fists and wiped furiously at her eyes which were now free of the tears that she was now fighting. Sakura scowled once again at the mention of her blonde teammate, frankly she didn't care what happened to him right now, what was he even thinking? She turned around to shout at the girl but when her eyes fell upon her she immediately felt pity, the girl's leg was brutally injured and potentially career threatening so she turned back to Sasuke without a word. Sakura drew a swab from her pouch and dabbed it with ointment she pulled from the pouch, after cleaning the arm that appeared to be broken she nodded in satisfaction, there were no cuts so all she had to do was sling the arm for the time being. She drew out a length of bandage from the same kit and wrapped it around the boys arm to restrict the movement. She attempted to ignore the girl who was hurling insults at her from a few meters away and gently ignored the voice in her head that told her Naruto had a perfectly legitimate reason to attack Sasuke like he had, it was clear that whatever had happened while she was gone had been brutal. She sighed to herself and cast a slightly more sedate look at her blonde teammate while she was tying Sasuke's sling, she couldn't completely ignore that voice it seemed. Why had she even tried to defend Sasuke, it was clear from what she'd seen that Sasuke had been out for blood when he'd attacked the blonde.

But then why had Sasuke changed so much, her eyes immediately fell upon the angry red skin of Sasuke's neck and she grimaced, Orochimaru had called it a cursed seal. Did that mean that Sasuke was cursed now, was that why he'd changed? She tried to be satisfied with the thought but couldn't let herself move off from it. She activated a low level diagnostic technique and ran it over the rest of Sasuke's body then nodded to herself. Now that she was sure that Sasuke was okay she turned her attention to the Sound girl with the savaged leg, even if the girl was an enemy she wouldn't be able to live with herself if she let the girl remain in that amount of pain.

Deep in her thoughts Sakura could hardly hear the screams being hurled at her from the girl, she reactivated the same jutsu over the girl and began to examine the damaged leg. Suddenly she gasped in fear and shock as something grabbed her hair, just as she was about to scream the tugging sensation disappeared and she rolled off of her feet and onto her hind. She looked in shock at the girl who was now holding wads of long pink hair in one hand and a kunai in the other. Suddenly she rejoined reality and heard the girls screams.

"Are you listening to me, Pinky! You already lost that fucking ridiculous hair! You want to lose a fucking eye too!?" Seeing the confusion in the pink haired girls face Kin's anger rose and she threw the hair she'd been holding into her face whilst simultaneously learching forward on top of her. The girl let out a fearful squeak as she landed on her back with Kin now straddling her waist. In a beat the kunai was brought to Sakura's neck and she met Kin's crazed eyes. "Save. The. Blonde." A moment passed in stunned silence whilst Kin's own long jet black hair pooled around the two before Sakura nodded hurriedly, and sat up as Kin rolled off of her and into the dirt. Kin let a breath out and a satisfied smile passed onto her lips as she watched the pink haired girl rush to Naruto's side and began to recast the diagnostic technique.

She ran the technique up Naruto's spine and then over his head, down his throat and over his stomach… Her expression changed slightly as it passed over his stomach and slowly she retraced the movement and her expression took a more confused look. Kin's face fell when she noticed the look and felt her heart jump into her throat. _'It's over … She found something, does that mean he's going to die? Was it my fault, could I have stopped him? Of course it was my fault …' _Just as all of her hope was about to vanish Kin saw the pink haired girls eyebrow rise and she realised, the girl wasn't concerned, just confused. She then watched as she raised Naruto's jacket up to reveal his stomach, and a large dark red mark. Kin tilted her head in confusion and made her way slowly closer to the blonde and examined the mark with confusion. The dark red mark wound around and around his torso until it reached his navel, then a pulse of red light sped out of his navel and followed the spiral out into the rest of his body. His body twitching slightly as it did, she breathed a sigh of relief when he did, it meant he was alive.

Kin smiled warmly and moved closer still to the boy until she could reach out and touch him, she moved herself around to his head and looked at the pink haired girl who either didn't mind or hadn't noticed, she was obviously too busy examining the mark on the boys stomach.

"What is that?" her voice seemed to shock the pinkette out of her examination and the two locked eyes for a second before Kin gestured to the mark.

"It looks like some kind of seal, it seems to be healing him though." Another red light made its way along the spiral as Sakura spoke and Kin pointed at it.

"And what's that then?" Sakura furrowed her brow and stared hard at Naruto's face.

"It's chakra, see that mark is following his chakra coils so the light is actually chakra moving along them. It's speeding up his cell growth, I'm only assuming that's what it's doing but it sounds impossible. The only other case I've read about concerning cell growth speed, the subject had to store chakra for years in her own seal." Kin nodded slowly

"So you think that thing is storing chakra?" She turned her eyes to look at Sakura who shook her head.

"A chakra seal is much simpler than this, we use them on training equipment all the time … This one looks more like containment than storage." Kin's jaw fell open in recognition and she slowly turned her face to examine the blondes face.

'_Shit. He really does contain a demon, doesn't he.'_

-TSHL-

The sweat poured off of Naruto's body as Sakura set up one of the tents and dragged both of her unconscious teammates inside, she spared a glance at the sound girl who was still in the clearing and sighed to herself. She hated that part of herself sometimes, the part that simply couldn't leave another person to suffer. After she made sure both of her teammates were comfortable inside the tent she made her way back out and strolled over towards the girl, the two observed each other for a few seconds before Sakura gestured at the girls leg.

"Do you need a hand with that, you've been moving it around a lot … There's probably a lot of damage." The girl stared hard in her direction and cast a wary eye in the direction of the tent, another few seconds thought and she gently nodded her head. Sakura took it as permission and approached gathering her supplies and equipment from her pouches as she did.

A short while passed in silence between the girls as Sakura carefully removed the remaining senbon from Kin's knee and did her best to bandage up her wound, after the final knot was tied Sakura finally made eye contact with the girl and asked the question that had been plaguing her mind.

"What happened?" The girl immediately broke the eye contact and looked to the floor.

"What do you mean, 'What happened?'" Sakura sighed and pointed at the tent a short distance away,

"I mean, both of my teammates are out of it because they nearly killed each other, I need to know what happened." Kin sighed and lay onto her back and hid her face from the pinkette behind her hands.

"The Uchiha attacked me and my team, we fought back and he beat us. When my team retreated, that scum beat me nearly to death and did that to my leg. If Naruto hadn't intervened I'd probably be dead, or just in a hell of a lot more pain." She spoke in a low voice that betrayed no lies, and Sakura knew instinctively that it the girl was telling the truth. _'It has to be that cursed seal …'_ Sakura nodded a few times, not that Kin saw and then just sighed and thanked the girl.

"I think it's best that you go, if Sasuke finds out that I helped you. It wouldn't be helpful, try and find your team." Sakura then stood and walked swiftly toward the tent to watch over her slowly healing teammates.

Kin stared in the direction of the tent and scowled, were all Konoha shinobi so weird. To heal an enemy, even if it was only to get information. She sighed, climbed to her feet and began to gather chakra to make her way into the tree's before stopping herself, would she really walk away from the blonde without thanking him, again? A smile made its way onto her lips as she thought of the perfect way to thank him.

-TSHL-

"**You know that what I'm saying is right. I know you do, You've seen that look in his eye, the drive that pushes him to amazing heights."** Naruto sat in the shallow water facing away from the giant beast, he hugged his knees tightly as the beast behind him spoke.

"Shut up, fox." His voice was low and the monster knew that his words were slowly seeping into the boys thoughts.

"**That same drive is becoming a problem though, you've witnessed it firsthand. He raised his hand against an ally, a teammate no less. Do you really think he isn't a threat to you, to your team, to Konoha?"** Naruto continued to stare into the black water of the tunnel and allowed himself to think over the words, He couldn't convince himself that the beast was wrong… but he couldn't give up hope, he closed his eyes tightly.

"Shut up, fox." He spoke the same words over and over under his breath getting louder as the beast spoke in an attempt to drown out its words.

"**He must be dealt with, he must be disposed of. He's a problem you can't ignore."** Naruto began screaming the same words over and over and turned around to face the monster with a furious expression.

"SHUT UP! You don't think I don't know that! He killed me, he literally killed me! If not for your chakra." He shook his head and climbed to his feet, then pointed at the fox behind the giant iron gate. "But you're no better! You don't care about Konoha, or my team, or even me! I don't know what your plan is, but I'm not gonna fall into it that easy!" He sniffed hard and drew himself to his full height, straightening his back and drawing his shoulders back. He thumped his chest once with his thumb and grinned at the beast. "I'm Uzumaki Naruto, and I'll save Sasuke, Believe it!" the beast was silent for a second before barking harshly, sending the blond sprawling backward.

"**Idiot! Do you think it'll be that easy, that he'll simply allow you to change his path? He is committed to it, and it is a path he walks alone. He needs no team, no ally, which makes you and this village nothing but a hindrance to him. A hindrance that he will violently cut loose at some point." **Naruto sat up and looked back down at the black water uncertainly, was the beast right. Would Sasuke eventually become a threat to everyone he cared about. He closed his eyes and shook his head, no matter what Sasuke had done in the past he was SURE that the boy would never become a threat to Konoha. He breathed a sigh of relief and stood in front of the fox again,

"You're wrong, fox. Sasuke is a Konoha shinobi. That means he has Jiji's Will of Fire, he'll never become a danger to Konoha." The beast rolled it's eye but decided against arguing further.

"**Fine, human's are so short sighted. When all I've said has come to pass though, maybe you'll see that I'm right about other subjects too. Like that other teammate of yours." **Naruto lifted an eyebrow at the mention of Sakura,

"What about her?"

"**She'll abandon you to, in favour of the Uchiha scum. She'll blame you for his short comings and blame you for his injuries and your own. Your team is broken and it's beyond fixing, if you try it'll only break further. Like trying to put a puzzle piece in a space it wasn't made for, you can force it to fit but all you're really doing is damaging the picture. You're the piece that doesn't fit." **Naruto Sighed and looked up into the darkness of the cavern above and allowed the darkness to consume his vision, he could sense the honesty in the beasts words and could tell that it truly believed what it was saying. As he was about to respond he felt a twinge in his leg and opened his eyes.

-TSHL-

Naruto stared up at the roof of the tent for a few seconds, slightly startled to be back in reality so swiftly. Slowly he became aware of himself again and he felt feeling flood his limbs again, he cringed against the pain and folded into a foetal position and allowed a pathetic moan to pass his lips. At the sound his female teammate turned to observe him, within a second she scrambled away from the Uchiha who's hair she had been gently caressing and toward the blonde.

"Naruto, are you okay?" She settled into a position next to him and gently ran a hand over the tender skin of his back, he flinched away from the touch and hardened himself against the pain, bringing himself into a sitting position. Sakura looked concerned but made no attempt to stop him, after a few moments Naruto nodded at Sasuke a short distance away.

"Is he gonna be okay?" Sakura followed his gesture and spent a second lingering on the object of her affection before nodding.

"He's been in and out of consciousness, but I'd say he'll be fine in a few hours." The girl, now satisfied that Naruto was healthy moved back across the tent and toward Sasuke. As she did the blonde stumbled out of the entrance of the tent and began to stretch his limbs, he hadn't wanted to worry Sakura but he knew that he was very far from okay really. He could _feel_ the Kyuubi's chakra flowing through him, healing all the damage he'd received. Undoing his death. After he regained a normal amount of control over his limbs, enough to make to trip to the tower he glanced around the clearing again. He identified it immediately as the one that he and Sasuke had fought in, but there was no sign of the sound shinobi. He raised an eyebrow and cast around again, had Kin's teammates returned to collect her after all?

"Hey, Sakura?" He called out to the tent whilst he scratched the back of his head in confusion, still looking into the trees around the clearing looking for any track that might have shown where the girl had gone, and what condition her leg would have been in. He almost tripped over himself when he saw the scroll sitting on the dirt outside the tent, very obviously placed so that they would find it, but no passersby would immediately notice it, he picked it up and then returned his now stern gaze back over the clearing. There would be no way that Kin's team would allow her to leave the Heaven Scoll, which meant that she'd had to have left on her own… with a dangerously injured leg.

"Where'd Kin- the sound chick go?" His voice was suddenly worried, which made Sakura take notice and poke her head out of the tent, silently the two observed each other before Sakura shrugged.

"She left a while ago, to find her team I guess." Naruto looked at the scroll cradled carefully in his palm, slightly aware that Sakura couldn't see it from her position.

"Was she, you know, was she okay?" The girl furrowed her brow at the question and shrugged again.

"Not really. Her leg was pretty messed up, I'd be surprised if she was still alive now really." Naruto scowled in response and pointed accusingly at his teammate.

"Why did you let her go then!?" Sakura scoffed in response and climbed out of the tent and to her feet.

"I didn't 'let her' go, I _made_ her go." Naruto shook his head slightly and took a step backward, before taking a few suddenly threatening steps toward his teammate.

"You _made_ her go, what does that mean, Sakura." The girl raised her palms in a calming gesture which did little to settle her blonde teammate and tried to calm him down in a slightly less confident voice.

"She was an enemy ninja, Naruto. From an enemy village! You saw what they did to Kabuto, to Sasuke!" Naruto spat on the floor at the mention of his other teammate but began speaking before Sakura could comment on it.

"She wasn't an enemy, Sakura." The girl threw her hands up in exasperation before holding them out toward Naruto as if asking him to explain. He didn't speak and instead tossed the scroll over to the girl who caught it easily, as she looked at it her eyes widened in shock and she slowly returned her slightly awed gaze back to the blonde. "She left us her Heaven Scroll, maybe an apology, maybe a thank you. Not the act of an enemy though." Numbly Sakura nodded to herself, and returned silently back into the tent, where Sasuke was blinking himself awake.

-TSHL-

Kin clung to a tree as she regained her breath, she'd known that she'd need to rest a lot with her leg as badly injured as it was and she was only hoping that her team had managed to scavenge another Heaven Scroll in order for them to complete the exam, and that they weren't too annoyed at her for 'losing' their other Scroll. She stared in the direction of the tower and made a short estimate of how far she was from it and to her teams temporary camp. She'd need a few hours in her current condition and she was silently confident that, provided her team got the scroll they needed, they'd pass the test easily. Then her eyes widened in shock and she turned to face the person who was suddenly terrifyingly close.

"You let me down, Tsuchi-chan." The girl swallowed and fell to her knees in a low bow,

"Forgive me, Orochimaru-sama, the Curse mark was too powerful. Even with a successful combination attack he was able to defeat us." The older man rolled his eyes at the display she gave and turned his back to her, folding his arms across his chest as he did.

"Come now, Kin. I didn't expect you to survive against the Uchiha, I meant your mission relating to the vessel." The girl gritted her teeth in fear, she'd forgotten about that completely… She was supposed to get closer to him and learn about him. The situation in the clearing would have been perfect. "Don't think I'm forgetting about those fools Dosu and Zaku either, running away like that was completely pathetic. Your defeat was a display of complete weakness too, but I haven't run out of use for you three yet." Kin raised her head from her position on the floor to stare at the Otokage once again before he looked over his shoulder at her, his tongue was hanging from his jaw and wrapped in it was the Heaven Scroll he'd shown her earlier. A few seconds passed while the Sannin tossed and caught the scroll a few times and appeared to be in thought, then he tossed it over to Kin who scrambled after it falling into the dirt as she did.

"You'll be competing in the preliminary matches before the final with that scroll. If you happen to win your matches you will be given another chance to redeem yourselves, if you lose then your life will be forfeit to the Edo Tensei." Fear struck Kin's body as she froze in place, she'd heard rumors of the jutsu. The one that brought the dead back amongst the living with the use of a living sacrifice, she felt her vision blur, her hearing drown. She couldn't lose her match… no matter who. Determination sparked behind her eyes and the Otokage smirked behind his calm exterior. "You will be the one to pass this information on to Dosu and Zaku. Make sure they know exactly how close they are to death, make sure they understand like you do." Kin nodded a single time through her daze and chimed in a robotic voice.

"Hai, Orochimaru-sama."

-TSHL-

**I'm sorry this chapter took so long, but there is a reason. I had to write it not once, or twice, but three times. Twice I lost the saved document of it and had to start from fresh. What a pain it was, but I finally got it finished.**


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